It was a beautiful, crisp fall Friday afternoon on Northwestern’s sprawling campus. The leaves were falling, the sun was shining and I was going home for the first time since moving to college. Waiting for me at home was a family reunion with family from Europe, my parents and sisters, a visit to all my friends who attend the University of Nebraska at Lincoln and a visit with all my friends at the Miss Teen Nebraska USA pageant. Everything was planned down to the minute. There was so much to look forward to, so naturally, what could possibly go wrong?

Because I didn’t have class on Fridays, I celebrated the weekend by staying out until the wee hours of the night before. Definitely the best move. My roommate’s mom was kind enough to volunteer to drive me to the airport, so I didn’t even have to pay for a cab! Little did I know, Midway was not the same as O’Hare, was significantly farther away AND there were massive amounts of traffic on Friday afternoons. I intermittently dozed off in the two hours it took to arrive at Midway, with the warm sunlight shining through the window, while attempting polite conversation.

Cut to 10 minutes before takeoff, and I am running to security. I have never been this late to an airport and am, so I thought, visibly panicked. Instead of verbalizing my aggravation, I just demonically stared down everyone that got in my way. As I am “gentle jogging,” also known as a walking at a brisk pace with sporadic all-out sprints, I realize not only are they paging me repeatedly over the loud speaker, but my dress is caught in my backpack. I was flashing all of Midway and could not stop to do anything about it. Confused, disoriented and desperate to find my gate, I gave up on trying to fix the situation.

After what seemed like hours of frantic jogging while exposing my behind to all of Chicago, I finally made it to my gate and checked in with the nice attendant. While she went off to see if I could still board the plane, a kind, middle-aged man politely said, “Uhhh young lady, uhm, your skirt is stuck, you might want to fix that,” at which point I am nearly in tears. Did he seriously think I did not know my bare ass was out to play for the world to see? Couldn’t he tell I was holding back tears trying not to yell at someone, anyone, for making me late when it was all my fault? At this point, I was so fed up I just walked away.

As I finally get personally escorted on to my flight, as the entire plane is staring me down for making them late, I tried to relax and focus on all the fun I would have once I arrived. When I finally debarked the aircraft, nerves on edge, generally pissed off and highly emotionally unstable, I walked through the security checkpoint and started scanning the crowd, looking for my family. Everybody was being greeted, hugged and led off to their happy and perfect lives, while I was left standing alone.

Nobody remembered to pick me up.

Apparently, so they say, there was a miscommunication about who was going to pick me up, back from college for the first time, alone and distraught, from the airport. Needless to say, it was not the welcome home I had hoped for. And that was my worst departure from NU moment.

– Alyssa Clough