The Lonely Cart – March 2008

Note to Reader: I believe that baggage handlers have one of the toughest jobs on the planet. I mean aside from brain surgeons, and rocket scientists, and doctors, and lawyers, and parents… Well maybe one of the toughest non pilot jobs at the airport. They are responsible for making sure that everyone’s bags get where they need to go. And it would be a huge amount of pressure to know that if they don’t do their job correctly then someone goes naked. And just in case you have never been to San Diego, CA and stumbled upon Black’s Beach, not everyone looks good naked!

I make a habit of being early to just about everything. I make a point to try to arrive about 15 min early. On this day however, due to car problems and the fact that my husband has to be at the hospital to round at 5:30am, I arrived not at the suggested arrival time of 7:00am, which would have been 2 hrs prior to boarding,. I arrived at 5:00am, for a 9:50am flight. So that makes me 3 hrs early and 4 ½ hrs before boarding. This gave me the unique experience of literally watching the airport wake-up which brings me to the point of this blog.

My gate was located just above what I believe to be baggage truck central. I wish I’d gotten a picture of all of the sleeping trucks and carts, but alas, that early in the morning my ability to have forethought was not all there.

I literally sat in that airport terminal for 5 hours and this poor cart had to sit and watch all the other carts get coupled together and made into little trains and never once was he selected to take part. He sat there all by himself. At one point I knocked on the glass as the men were debating on which carts to select in order to put in a good word for this lonely little cart, but because the glass at the airport is bullet proof, which also means it is knocking proof, and the fact that these guys wear giaganormous head phones to protect their ears from the loud airplane engine noises, my efforts went un-noticed and they actually ended up taking the set of three on the right side of this picture rather than him.

So, since I had nothing better to do I made up a whole story in my head about how this little cart never got the chance to be part of a train and because of that never got the chance to prove how great of a baggage cart he could be. Then one day, the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, (The busiest travel day of the year!!!) all of the other carts were out as part of cart trains and their was a need to have a VERY important bag that needed to make a very tight connection so that it could get to a little girl that was traveling by herself to her grandmother’s house. The little cart said to the baggage handler “Please pick me! Pick me!!! I will be the best little luggage cart you’ve ever toated!” Well the man hemmed and hawed and finally, because there were no other carts, except a very old and cranky cart that squeaked and bumped and pulled a little to the left, kind of like the grocery carts that I somehow ALWAYS manage to select, he backed his toating truck up to the little lonely cart and settled the coupling pin into place and off they went.

Well without making a short story long, this little cart did an AWESOME job. They raced away to pick up a little pink princess suitcase and the did a quick U Turn and sped down the tarmac and got there just in time to gently deposit the case onto the conveyer belt to the airplane’s belly just before they closed the door. As the truck and cart pulled slowly away from the airplane and were stopped for just a moment by the ground crew to let the airplane pull out and get on it’s way, the driver turned in his seat and whispered to the little cart, “you did a great job little cart! Thank you for not being old and grumpy and for not pulling a little to the left”.

From that day on the man only chose that cart and they were a great team. The man and little cart were always chosen first to take care of the tight connecting bags. They carried luggage for movie stars, and politicians, and even a few famous country music singers. The man and little cart had a wonderfully long and successful career and they lived happily ever after!

The End

Till Next time,
Bon Voyage