4 ~— Wednesday, November 30, 1988 - North Shore News

LAST WEEX I flew out to
the West Coast. I opted to
fly via the U.S. to save
money.

The trip from Toronto was
uneventful, except for a small has-
sle when I crossed the border by
bus to get to my connecting flight
in Buffalo, New York. When the
guard asked for identification, I
pulled out my wallet only to
discover that both my driver’s
licence and my birth certificate
were missing.

Bos HUNTER

o © st ictly personal

spat the card back out with ill-
concealed mechanical contempt.

The fact that I didn’t have tick-
ets and scarcely any remaining
cash, as well as having neither a
driver's licence nor birth certifi-
cate, naturally made the border
guard suspicious. So I was shunted
off to the immigration office,
always an inauspicious sign.

Some straight, man-to-man,
up-front, direct eye contact, lay-
ing-it-on-the-line talk later, I was
allowed through.

In Seattle, it took nearly an hour

TD he fact that I didn’t have tickets
and scarcely any remaining cash, as
well as having neither a driver’s
licence nor birth certificate, naturally
made the border guard suspicious. ’”’

Fortunately, a Norts Shore
News press card was acceptable as
proof that I was who I claimed to
be. A dozen credit cards dida’t
count. I later found out my wife
had taken the birth certificate in
order to apply for something. As
for the driver's licence, who
knows? Now I have to apply for
another one.

But it wasn’t until the return
flight some five days later that
everything really began to unravel.

For openers, my right foot had
started aching, probably an early
arthritic condition. I could hardly
walk on it. Airports, one quickly
discovers, are for people with two
healthy feet.

When I got to the airport, I was
also to discover that my return
tickets from Seattle to Buffalo
were missing. Somewhere along

” the line, I’d lost them.

When I limped over to the bank-
ing machine to replenish my cash,
the automatic teller crisply in-
formed me that the account was
overdrawn. TRANSACTION

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of arguing with an overworked
underpaid ticket counter person to
get the lost ticket issuc settled at
the same price I'd paid originally.
Not being able to provide adequate
id. didn’t help the situation,
needless to say.

After that, I had to wait three
hours to make the connecting
flight to Chicago.

Cranky and tired, I hobbled on
to my plane just after midnight.
The seat was narrow, the wind
raged, it was a bumpy flight, and
my throbbing foot wouldn’t let me
go to sleep. To make things worse,
they were out of pillows and
blankets, so I had to use my jacket
as a blanket with a rolled-up shirt
as a pillow. Not good.

Foolishly, 1 took a sleeping pill.

The pill didn’t quite work, but it
did manage to leave me so groggy
when I lurched off the plane in
Chicago that I could hardly make
myself move.

Chicago’s O'Hare airport, as
everyone kzows, is the largest in
the world. To reach my connecting
flight in Buffalo, 1 had to hobble

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about a mile through crowded cor-
ridors, stopping every so many
yards to ease the pain in my foot.

I did make it to the right counter
— only to reach into my jacket for
the ticket.

And not find it!

Obviously it had fallen out of
my jacket during the tossing and
turning on the way from Seattle.

And so, slowly, painfully, I
limped back through the mile of
corridors to the previous arrival
portal, where a kindly attendant
found my ticket lying on the floor.

Turn around. Hobble groggily
back across O'Hare. Get back to
the connecting fliht just in time to
clamber aboard and be whisked
skyward.

At Buffalo there was another
two-hour wait before the bus left
for Toronto. We were only delayed
an hour at the border while
everyone was cross-examined.

And then, finally, into Toronto,
being deposited at the downtown
bus depot near city hall. All that
remained was a two-block hike to
a subway, a ride out to North
York, another bus, four more
blocks of limping along the subur-
ban streets, arriving at our rented
house roughly 24 hours after I had
started out from Vancouver.

My kid opened the door and
hugged me, accidentally popping
one of the lens out of my glasses.

Having been told that a likely
cure for my sore foot would be to
drink some liquid calcium, I stag-
gered straight to the medicine cab-
inet. With my glasses broken, I
squinted at the label. It seemed
right.

E took two swigs of the terrible-
tasting stuff.

About an hou: ‘ater I started
convulsing, having swallowed
calamine lotion instead of liquid
calcium. The barfing, etc., went on
for about two hours.

Some trips go more smoothly
than others @

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