"Oh crap. I thought Mom told you"

I took off from Auckland on Thursday at 7:00 p.m and landed in Seattle on Thursday at about 7:00 p.m. It took about 24 hours to fly from NZ to Seattle counting layovers in Fiji and LA, but due to the international date line, it was still Thursday.

At the airport in Seattle (while I was waiting for my bags), I called my mom's house in Bellingham to tell her I'd arrived, and to find out whether I should take an airporter bus 100 miles to Bellingham, or whether someone had driven down to get me. She told me that my older brother Scott and my #1 son were indeed on their way to pick me up ... but they had gotten a flat tire so they would be a little late. (Their frustration level might be a little elevated, too, I was thinking) Mom said I should call their cell phones to get the latest timeframe. OK.

I called #1 son's cell phone, who gave me an update on the flat tire, then passed the phone to Scott:
Scott - "I suppose you heard the news"
me - "What news? Did Dad die already?"
Scott - "Oh crap. I thought Mom told you."
So that's how I heard the news: standing at a pay phone near baggage claim in the Seattle airport. My eyes start to well up. I guess I knew that he only had a few days left to live - and it takes 24 hours to get there - but somehow, I was hoping to see him before he died. Not to say goodbye; I did that in July when he was still aware of the world around him, and knew who I was. Maybe I wanted to see him one last time to confirm his frailty and to determine that yes, it was OK for him to go now. Or perhaps I just wanted to be there with my mom at the moment it happened. But I didn't get there in time. He died soon after my airplane took off, about 22 hours ago.

Once I got off the phone I tried to collect my luggage, but the entire carousel had been emptied while I was talking with Scott, and the Baggage Nazis had moved all unclaimed bags (mine) to the lost luggage area. So I spent the next 10 minutes trying to track down my two suitcases. I felt like telling the people at the Lost Luggage desk, "Look, my dad just died, and I really don't have the energy to deal with lost luggage at the moment." Fortunately, they retrieved my bags before I resorted to using my sob story. I am obviously not above milking the situation for the highest pity factor I can get.

While I was waiting for Scott and #1 son to arrive from the tire repair place, I changed from a southern hemisphere sundress into northern hemisphere long pants and dug out my long winter coat and mittens. There was 8 inches of snow in Seattle at the time. Brrrr. Scott and #1 showed up soon after, with hugs all around. They were remarkably calm in spite of the recent flat tire. On the 2 hour ride back to Bellingham, we had lots of time to talk and process. We agreed that when I called my mom from the airport, she probably didn't want to tell me that Dad had died because it would get her started again, which is perfectly understandable. But poor Scott felt absolutely awful for having delivered such emotional information in that way. It doesn't matter. Bad news is bad news, no matter who delivers it or how it's delivered.