mistake

On the way to see my Mom last weekend I screwed up and made Monnya's reservations as Monnya Silver. When Monnya was in first grade her teacher called me and told me that Monnya had changed the spelling of her name from Manya to Monnya. She was tired of people mispronouncing her name as man ya. Her father and I said it made sense and was fine. By then we were used to her strong willed decision making.I forgot that her license was still in her given name and that when she travels she uses Manya.

The security people at the airport didn't take it lightly.They considered it a different name and not a different spelling of the same name. Monnya was interrogated for ten minutes.I felt a little guilty for messing up and putting her through this.She said it was kind of scary but wasn't upset. We still had plenty of time to catch our plane.They suggested we handle it at the airline counter when we got in to avoid hassles on the return flight. When we got in we went directly to the airline counter and they said they couldn't do anything.
On our way back the ticket counter people flagged her boarding pass. We only had thirty minutes till the plane took off. I had been anxious on the drive to the airport because it took longer than we had anticipated. Monnya told me to relax and trust in the universe.

I guess I taught her that so she could reteach it to me when I forgot.When we got to security she had to go through a second check. First we had to wait for an available female attendant. Then she was searched and all of her belongings were searched with a special probe and a machine that registered whatever they were looking for. I was getting more and more anxious. I kept trying to breathe and be in my circle. Luckily for her I was behind the gate and she didn't have to deal directly with my rising anxiety. She was feeling achey and stuffed up. I felt responsible that she was going through all of this because of my mistake on top of feeling bad physically.The whole thing took twenty minutes and I had it in my mind that travelers had to be at the gate twenty or thirty minutes before the plane took off to be allowed to board the flight. That assumption was making it hard to breathe and creating lots of stress in my body and mind. I really did not want to be stuck in El Paso because Monnya had to fly to Toronto to a performance the next day and I had clients scheduled. Part of me always knows that everything will be OK if my definition of OK is very broad. That knowledge was very hard to access in the moment. When she was done I ran to the gate and breathlessly asked if we could still board the plane which was taking off in ten minutes. The women looked at me like I was some strange overreacting being and said sure.The story I had created led to an assumption which led to extreme stress. Monnya handled the whole thing gracefully.The flight was uneventful and she slept the whole way. I got to contemplate on what I had created and by the end of the flight I was finding the whole thing more amusing. We raced across town so that Monnya could get to her doctor's appointment in Evergreen on time. When I got home I began to have cold symptoms. Getting sick is one way I allow myself to rest and take it easy. I sleep more and do less. Next time I would like to be kinder to myself about my mistake.I would like to give myself a break and know that it's Ok that I don't handle things with equanimity.I will recognize that that level of urgency almost always signals that I have given my ego free reign to let me know how much I have done it wrong and the dire consequences which the future has in store for me. Then that conscious awareness that my ego is running amuck will enable me to be kinder to myself about not being kind to myself. Then it would be possible to comfort myself and include my mistake and anxiety about my mistake in showing up for myself. I will now kindly take my stuffed up sinuses and go to bed, grateful that I have an easy day tomorrow. I will also consider giving myself an easy day without having to be sick. How about you?