At the gate my flight was delayed for about an hour due to weather. There was a huge thunder storm that had just rolled in. It didn't look very big on the radar, but was extremely noisy with a lot of lightening. I kept thinking about poor Gizmo in his crate, possibly already on the plane and how scared he must be because he is always terribly jumpy when it comes to loud noises, thunder and fireworks in particular, and now he's in an unfamiliar environment alone with all hell breaking loose around him. I felt like a horrible human being, but kept telling myself that he was on his way to see his mom and we would all be together again as a little family like normal. I just couldn't shake the gnawing voice in the back of my mind that kept saying, "what if one of them dies on the plane?" or "what if this experience drives them crazy and they're not ever the same?" I tried to breathe and shake these thoughts and remain calm. Shaking the thoughts was easy, there were several crying babies waiting at the gate with me that made it impossible to think about anything at all, so that was nice.
When we finally boarded the plane and I got to my seat I was very pleased. When Bobbi reserved my ticket she paid for me to have the extra leg room and I had a whole lot of it!
When I sat down, however, I noticed that my tray was in the arm of the seat, which meant that the seat was a bit narrower than the rest of the seats on the plane and the armrest didn't go up, so I couldn't spread out at all. The stewardess noticed that I was shifting around trying to get comfortable and told me that there was an entire empty row of four seats in the back of the plane and if I wanted to move there I could. I decided to take her up on that and, my god, am I glad I did! Not only did I have a TV screen and a bunch of cool charging options for my phone, but I also had the opportunity to put up all the arm rests and lie down across the four seats and sleep!
When the flight started I waited until they served dinner, then took some of the ZQuil I bought and stretched out across the seats, covered myself with two of those little blankets they give you, piled up all four of the pillows from my row and conked right out! I got up after a while and went back to the galley area to ask for something to drink and the stewardess said something that sounded like ice cream, and when I acted surprised she said, "Oh, you must have been sleeping, we served ice cream. I'll get you one!" So she handed me a Klondike bar while she poured me a Pepsi! I ate that, then browsed the entertainment options, watched some info shows on the UAE and a few episodes of Big Bang Theory. I started watching a movie, but got interrupted several times and wasn't terribly interested in it anyway, so I just turned it off and laid back down and went to sleep! All in all it was an awesome plane ride, hardly felt like the 13 hours it took!
When we landed I got off the plane and walked for what felt like the whole length of the airport and then some before I got to Immigration. When I did I saw that there were two lines, one said "Visas" the other said "Gulf Coast Countries, Emeratis, and Other Nationalities." The "Visas" line was huge, but the other windows only had one or two people there, so I wanted to go there, and I thought, "I don't have a visa yet and I don't need to try to get one here because I'll be covered under Bobbi's, so I should be good." When I went to go into the customs area there were two men standing there, one was a short guy in a suit with airport credentials, the other one was taller in traditional Arab dress, a kandura and a keffiyeh. The guy in the suit greeted me and I handed him my passport.
"Where's your visa?"
"I don't have one, my wife's an ADEC teacher and I will be covered under her visa." This seemed to really confuse him, he furrowed his brow and shook his head.
"You need a visa, you can not come without a visa," he said as he handed my passport to the guy in the kandura and said something in Arabic. The taller guy shook his head and said something in an exasperated tone that I can only imagine was along the lines of, "He doesn't need a visa with an American passport." The shorted guy handed me my visa and with a very wide, seemingly genuine smile, directed me to the "Other Nationalities" line. And that's how I had my first arabian heart attack.
So I went through line and the customs guy stamped my passport, then I went to the baggage claim and I must have been one of the very few people who were not catching a connecting flight, because my luggage came out very quickly. I loaded it onto one of those luggage trolley things and wheeled it over to Customs. I was sure, with my two full-sized/over-sized suitcases and my bodybag of a duffel bag and my two carry-on bags traveling by myself, that I would be stopped and searched, but I went into the "Nothing to Declare" line and walked right through!
A huge smile plastered itself on my face because I knew that my next step was looking for Bobbi at the terminal and reuniting with my wife! At the end of the last hallway I looked through the doors and instantly recognized the sweet face with brown hair and glasses bobbing in the crowd. She directed me to meet her off to the side and when I got there I pushed my trolley away and wrapped my arms around my wife for the first time in over a month, and it was amazing. I held her tight and kissed her cheek and she squeezed me right back. When we left the airport and got into the parking garage the heat and humidity slapped me in the face, hard. Her glasses fogged up the way they usually do when you come in from the winter cold into a warm house, and she took them off, polished them and explained that that happens every time she leaves an air conditioned building.
We loaded my bags into her car and went to the cargo area to get the dogs. That process actually went pretty smoothly, except for the vet that was on duty was nowhere to be found, so we had to have someone call him. Over an hour later he finally showed up to tell us that his shift is ending and we need to call his colleague who has the next shift, and he gave us his number and left. When his colleague got there he was very upset at first at having to do work that the other vet should have done, but once he calmed down he was a huge help and very kind. The process still took a long time, but there were no more major hiccups, and at the end of it we loaded their crates along with my luggage and the dogs and us into Bobbi's rented Toyota Camry and began our two hour ride home. When we got there I showered, then we all four climbed into the bed and went to sleep.
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