"I need a wheelchair!"

MacK saying goodbye from Aunt Kathy's

Jackson had to work in Orlando on Thursday morning so he headed there and I took care of things here in Naples. I ran MacKenzie up to Aunt Kathy's and finished getting us all organized for the trip. Jackson got home to Naples, picked me up and we headed over to the Miami airport which is about 1.75 hours away. Our flight was scheduled to leave at 22:35 which meant we'd had a full day before it was time to go.

We went early enough to be able to have dinner at Chuy's then hang out in the sky lounge until our flight. All was well, we'd had dinner, returned our rental car (it is way cheaper to rent a car and return it to the airport than to park when you're leaving for an extended period) and our flight was loading. All of the sudden, Jackson did not feel well. He was shaky and cold. 

We are now in a crowded gate area and Jackson is full on melting down. He does not feel well. He cannot take this flight. We go up to the counter to see what they can do for us and the airline calls the paramedics. WHAT?! I'm attributing this to a language barrier since it was an air carrier from Spain, Iberia Air. 

The paramedics come and take his vitals. They proclaim that they cannot help him as he has early stages of the flu. They continue to throw up their hands unable to help. Jackson then says, "get away from me then!" to these medical professionals who now all look at me with pity. I accept it. One asks me if he is always like this (grumpy) and I say, "yes, this is his general disposition." Said paramedic then rubs my back. I'd normally hate this. In this moment I'm taking all the support I can get.

I turn back to the airline folks and tell them that we cannot fly if he's sick and contagious. I ask what they can do for us. They sputter. Some run away. Finally they give us a 1-800 number to call and then move on. People are trying to get on an international flight which means the boarding area is mass chaos. The paramedics give us one last piece of advice which was, "do not go to the hospitals in Miami. We have an outbreak of dengue fever and all of our hospitals are currently cesspools. If he needs fluids, and he may, you need to get out of Miami before seeking medical care." 

Let's pause. Yes, Miami is in the United States. No, it did not feel like it at that point. Also, if these good folks think this girl was returning to an ER in a major city without dying first, they were wrong. It was nice to have no options, though. Ugh. 

We decide to head for a hotel for the evening because Jackson doesn't feel up to renting another car to get back to Naples at this point. Jackson and I started walking for the main terminal and he is just shuffling. Suddenly I hear him say, "I NEED A WHEELCHAIR!" 

Let's pause. Yes, my husband with the onset of the flu has now decided he cannot walk. Heaven. It's me. HELP!

A kind, tiny Spanish woman finds a wheelchair and agrees to get him back to the main terminal. After losing control of his chair and slamming him into a few walls (I mean I cannot even type this without laughing at the mind image), we make it. He is able to somehow muster the strength to walk to the lobby of the airport hotel.

Listen, this is Miami. The airport hotel is not the new Westin found in Denver. We're basically checking into my dorm room at IU from 2002. No updates. 2002. I pay the astronomical $200 nightly rate and we head to our room. Jackson gets in the shower and I start manning the phones trying to figure out our flight options. 

At this point I have no idea how long this flu will last. If we'll need to get a car in middle of the night to seek additional medical care. Nothing. Iberia Airlines customer service sucks. It will cost more to replace our tickets than to just let them go. I cannot take any additional stress so I just hang up without changing our tickets or making any decisions. This turns out to be a wonderful thing. 

Jackson takes his hot shower then settles into bed after taking some ibuprofen that I always carry with me when we travel. We picked up a water somewhere. It had to have been a Good Samaritan who hooked us up with that. Thanks, Lord. Finally, he's snoring. Nurse Jenna crawls into bed (our room had two beds because it was a dorm room from 2002) and only mildly wonders what kind of critters are sleeping with her in this place. I finally fall asleep and people check in next door. It is now like 03:00 and suddenly these people are loudly trying to get into our room via the connecting doors. I panic. Jackson is out cold and we're about to get robbed in Miami. Suddenly Jackson is up and calling the front desk. Security comes up. The idiots next door say they were trying to lock the door, not open it. They're lying. Security tells them to chill. Jackson goes back to bed. My nerves are now officially shot and I wait for morning.

Snug as a bug.

Morning comes and Jackson showers again. He is alive. He feels better. Not 100% better, but better enough to travel. He decided to head down to the Iberia counters in the airport to see what he can get arranged. I sit in the room stunned that this guy is just back in action like nothing happened.

Am I annoyed? Yes. Am I grateful? Yes. Am I still a little annoyed? Oh, I answered that already.

In the miracle of all miracles our flight actually never took off the night before as they needed a part and the repair shops were closed for the night. Since I did not make a change to our flight the night before we got treated just like everyone else and rescheduled for a new flight. We got checked into our dorm hotel around 01:30 and folks on the canceled flight got checked in around 05:00. We paid and they had vouchers, but otherwise we got the better deal really. We slept while they waited to see if they could take off. 

Iberia put us on a new flight leaving at 17:00 which meant we'd lose an entire day of vacation, but would still get to our trip. We hung out in the dorm until checkout time then went through the airport to get some lunch. We eventually boarded our flight and continued this long journey to Spain.

He's back! 

We ended up in a two seater row so that was great and pretty comfortable. We landed in Madrid which has to be the largest, fanciest airport in the world and spent a few hours in a club lounge before catching our final 1.5 hour flight over to Mallorca. It was in the club lounge that I realized that my wasp sting from my tennis lesson the other night had engulfed my entire knee and most of my leg. My skin was red and hot to the touch. Did I call a medic? No. I just rolled a cold water bottle down my leg and kept moving. Women vs. men isn't even a contest, friends. 

Mallorca (Majorca) is one of Spain's Balearic Islands in the Mediterranean. We had hotel points to cash in with Hyatt and they have a super fancy property on the island. We landed, rented our car and made the roughly hour long drive from the airport to our resort. I've never been more tired. I was trying every trick in the book to not fall asleep at the wheel. We eventually made it and the resort was beyond our expectations. It was gorgeous. And it had showers and a bed. This meant it was a true paradise. We were so excited to just get to our room, albeit a day late, and start actually enjoying this vacation. Let's be real, I needed a vacation just from the transit experience!