MDW To DCA To The WH!

I've flown about 8000 miles in the friendly skies above our nation in this month alone.

Instead of flying back to my home sweet humidity today as scheduled after spending a few days in Chicago for the inaugural National Transgender and Gender Non Conforming Anti-Violence Conference that was embedded in the Incite! Color of Violence 4 Conference, the Air Marshal found herself on another Southwest flight to Washington DC.

I got the word while I was in Chicago I was invited to attend a White House event that will discuss trans women of color on the Transgender Day of Visibility.  Since it made more sense for me to do the shorter travel distance travel to DC from Chicago instead of Houston, that's what happened.  

But I did have a frustrating moment before I left Chicago.   After getting there on an express CTA train to Midway from downtown after I bid farewell to Joanna Cifredo, Vanessa Victoria and Elizabeth Rivera who were headed to O'Hare on the Green Line train we started at the Cermak Rd station on, I was there in plenty of time for my 1:15 PM departure on a beautiful Chicago spring day .

Ran into Mattee Jim on my way to the ticket counter to check my bag and found out we were booked on the same flight, so this is already continuing to be a great day.   Checked bag, headed for TSA security and that's when it started going sideways.

I cleared TSA security, and as I put my leather coat back on I noted my phone wasn't in my coat jacket pocket.   Since I was still at the checkpoint, I started asking the TSA agents on duty to help me locate it.

After a few minutes of fruitless searching, I had no choice but to exit TSA security I'd just cleared and retrace my steps all the way back to the CTA train I'd gotten off of but hadn't departed for downtown yet.

After negative sightings of my phone at the ticket counter and the CTA station, I reluctantly headed back to TSA security to reclear it and head to my flight at gate B-20 in a somewhat pissed off mood.

The bumpy at times flight on take off and landing didn't help, but Mattee's soothing presence made me forget about it for a little while.  So did seeing Ruby and Lourdes when they picked us up at the Columbia Heights Metro station and after dropping Lourdes off, she dropped me and Mattee at our hotel, the Washington Plaza.

There is a happy ending to this story.   While taking my boots off in he hotel room, noted something shiny on the floor, and miracle of miracles, it was my missing phone.

Oh well, at least I can call you DC peeps now and get some sleep for the White House event tomorrow knowing that my phone didn't get left in Chicago unlike my travel pillow and is still in my possession.