Previous columns have detailed my family\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s experiences during our travels since our retirement from teaching. We opted not to buy fancy cars or houses and instead put some funds into travel.<\/p>\n
Of course, the fact that our oldest son, Stanley Adam, moved to Denmark with Microsoft several years ago, took himself a Copenhagen bride and sired two daughters has something to do with where and how often we travel.<\/p>\n
We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been fortunate that our son\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s vacation days often coincide with ours, and either we spend days visiting at their home or we find another destination. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s enabled us to visit much of western and central Europe, and we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve even gone as far as Austria, Sweden, Nuremberg and the Czech Republic.<\/p>\n
We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve noticed how the level of trust seems to tighten the farther east we go into Europe; the farther we travel from home, the more urgency there is in having the right papers in place.<\/p>\n
In earlier columns I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve mentioned the many times my boarding pass has been initialed and handed to personnel at the gates for \u00e2\u20ac\u0153a closer look,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d as they call it. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been made to go back through x-ray machines that check for knives, guns, liquids, explosives, or anything else that might imperil the flight.<\/p>\n
It doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t get better. To half of the security world, I must look like a terrorist.<\/p>\n
Here are some of the not-so-hilarious instances in which I seriously believed our flight home would be delayed. We were on a Highlands study tour to Trujillo (really!), Spain, when a fellow student, who should have known better, hollered out, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Hey, Art, where\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d you hide the gun?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
Now that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s something we never want to even whisper in the presence of TSA personnel. But he did, and naturally, I was singled out and escorted to a room where four people looked me over. One of the inspectors, whom I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d met on a previous trip, remembered that I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d complimented her on how she initialed my passport. I believe that personal touch helped speed things up.<\/p>\n
Yet another inspector noticed that the airport dog, with a dismaying similarity to Snoopy of the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Peanuts\u00e2\u20ac\u009d comic strip, sniffed my camera bag \u00e2\u20ac\u201d into which I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d earlier slipped an orange. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d forgotten that food brought from departing shores is forbidden. Fortunately, my new acquaintance with the neat penmanship, vouched for my non-terrorist demeanor.<\/p>\n
And a small pocketknife I carried ended in the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153prohibited\u00e2\u20ac\u009d box. What happens to the stuff we all surrender? A yard sale?<\/p>\n
And worse, when Adam acquired a fine set of tools to perform computer repairs, some inspector, obviously in need of extra attention, practically performed a cha-cha, bellowed, and once he had everyone\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s attention, did a LeBron James imitation by slam-dunking the tools into a trash bin. That gesture made my family wonder why airports don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have small lockers to store such items.<\/p>\n
It bugs me that so much of travel is predicated on mistrust of others. It was just a tiny victory when I turned 75 and discovered people my age don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t need to remove their shoes when passing through the scanning equipment.<\/p>\n
Qualifying for that privilege was no big whoopee, as I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t stow bombs inside my shoes all that often.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u00a2 \u00e2\u20ac\u00a2 \u00e2\u20ac\u00a2<\/p>\n
The expectation that I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d failed to carry necessary documents hit me more recently. My column on the perils of renewing a driver\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s license drew reaction from readers. I mentioned a driver who\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d been sent home for lack of a crucial document.<\/p>\n
Regulations demand a combination of marriage license, birth certificate, Social Security number and receipts that verify place of residence. Although I applaud the courtesy and competence of personnel at the local MVD office, I still shudder when I go to renew my license.<\/p>\n
Part of the trepidation comes from previous experience of being turned away because of missing papers. That happened to the friend I wrote about earlier, who was sent away because the names on her birth certificate didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t match her current license.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re sorry, but you still need to provide this form and that form,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d is the way the woman described her ordeal. You see, she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been widowed twice and divorced once, and that resulted in several name changes.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153So what do I do before I can get the proper documentation?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she asked. The clerk answered, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Just drive carefully!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
One reason I fear I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m close to being shoved into the slammer is my lack of a REAL driver\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s license that won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t come unless I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve lined up all my other ducks. My Social Security card, printed on what seems like onionskin paper, gave up its pigment back in the Dark Ages.<\/p>\n
And it must have gone through several laundry cycles before giving up the ghost. Don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t officials realize flimsy papers intended to be whipped out of our billfolds often, undergo abuse?<\/p>\n
In this high-tech world, can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t we find a better way, such as a database, that stores our information without the need to make trips back home for that tax bill, or to the courthouse for a name change?<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, please notice how I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve spelled my name in this column: Arturo. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s how my midwife wrote it.<\/p>\n
That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s my name (for a while), and I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m sticking to it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Previous columns have detailed my family\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s experiences during our travels since our retirement from teaching. We opted not to buy fancy cars or houses and instead put some funds into travel. Of course, the fact that our oldest son, Stanley Adam, moved to Denmark with Microsoft several years ago, took himself a Copenhagen bride and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1629"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1629"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1629\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1630,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1629\/revisions\/1630"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1629"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1629"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1629"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}