Last September, my husband and I had to return to my hometown Maracaibo, after a few days of vacation in the beautiful Dominican Republic.
That Saturday we were returning to our house, let me tell you that I missed and longed for it, that special day began, our horror movie 🎥 and if my husband and I do not have good mental health, I think the anguish we experienced brought out the worst emotions, which do not help much to process the situation.
It all started at the Punta Cana airport, with a long line that became agonizing to check the bags, when suddenly, for an hour the baggage check was interrupted by a strike of the workers at the airport of course the flight is delayed until finally after 10 hours of waiting in uncomfortable chairs, they cancel the flight! Almost at 11 o'clock at night, there were desperate moments, which if I describe in more detail the situation to all of you who read, it would be too much information.
I can try to summarize it in hours of anguish, tiredness, uncertainty and worry. Managing the unforeseen, changing plans added to the stress of the airports, getting up very early, in addition to this the lines to check bags and that you are the ideal weight so as not to pay more money for excess weight, going through the checkpoints, running so as not to miss the connection and if we add to that the flight delays and the cancellation of your flight to return home at the last minute, it's horrible.
We were 300 people handling everything described in different ways, and this is where I want to highlight the importance of having sanity, patience, I mean... clarity and good mental and emotional health so that my husband and I can face this situation without dying in the attempt, fainting, collapsing from helplessness and accepting that there are things we cannot control.
At least we kept the good mood, for example, it helped us to see every photograph of the moments we lived on our vacation and talk with other passengers who, like us, were stranded, waiting to return to our homes.
We tried to keep calm by seeing others leading with shouting and swearing what we were all going through.
From this rather rough experience at the airport, I am left with the satisfaction of traveling with the one you love, and that doing so is not only a destination, it is a reminder that life needs pauses, enjoyment and connection. We finally arrived home on Sunday after a very long return weekend, to our home sweet home.
By the way, these booties have more miles on them than I do. They only need one more, I would like to return next year to the Camino de Santiago.
Janitze 🥾
Any images in this post are taken with my iPhone 12, the Infinix pro-note 30 or with the camera eighties Rolleiflex 2.8 f, and edited with Canva
Icons by: Icofinder
Separator made with Canva by @janitzearratia
Translation with |DeepL