Groundhog Day at the Pittsburgh Airport

I'm at the Pittsburgh airport, Concourse D. I’ve gotten to know it quite well over the last 24 hours. Yesterday, I arrived at the aiport around noon, waited in the security line, took the train to the departures terminal and found my gate a good hour and a half before take-off – like a responsible traveler. Gate D80. Our departure time came and went while we were being provided with updates from our gate agent roughly once every ten minutes. I wandered. I found a Starbucks as well as some nice tables with comfortable chairs, and stood in line behind a besuited businessman who sheepishly asks for a lattice of extra caramel on his iced latte and turns to me and says this caramel is the highlight of this day. Back to D80. Our last update was just to tell us when our next update will be. It is now three hours past the original departure time. The problem is not in Pittsburgh; the problem is in New York City. Weather. I’m not even trying to go to NYC, simply through it to Frankfurt. But in NYC, nothing is going in or out. Eventually, our flight was cancelled. I was rebooked for an early afternoon flight the next day to catch the exact same flight from JFK 24 hours later. 

Now, seasoned travelers will know that this type of cancellation entitles the travelers to practically nothing. (When there is a mechanical malfunction, some maintenance problem that even just delays a flight, you might be eligible for compensation as those are technically the airline’s fault. That's what happened to C and myself a few months ago, during our saga of a return from California.) This means that this time, even though I needed to find accommodation for the night, the airline could offer me at best a „distressed rate“ at one particular hotel (which may even have been full, considering the number of passengers who were delayed until the next day) – and that’s all. Even that distressed rate would have been a blow. But luckily, serendipitously, my mother – who had dropped me off at the airport a mere 6.5 hours previously – was still in the general area doing work, and she could simply pick me up again.

We had a lovely evening and a relaxed morning together, and here I am again – but now I know the terminal. I go to the faster alternative security checkpoint, which I didn’t do yesterday. I don’t fight with the water fountain that insists on pouring water horizontally, at an angle that doesn’t agree with the neck of my reusable water bottle. Instead, I head to the water-bottle refilling station that I found late in the afternoon yesterday. I go back to the same Starbucks to get a cup of tea – the gentleman behind the counter looks at me. I look at him. „Were you here yesterday?“ – „Yes. Were you?“ He was kind yesterday and is kind again today, giving me an extra tea bag in case my journey today gets delayed again and tells me I can just come back and they’ll give me a cup of hot water for that teabag. I won’t tell him that my backpack is stuffed with Peets coffee.

For now, I’m enjoying my tea and then I’ll it's back to – believe it or not – D80, where I sincerely hope, pleasant as this has been, that it does not all begin again.