California Dreaming Part 2

SATURDAY

As Jeff is making his speech to the crowd I am in a funck. I am not sure if it's because Tracey told me Jeff was good looking or if I am just wrapped up in the moment. The only thing that is running through my head at this moment is that I am finally getting to this point. I am seeing with my own eyes the person that a year ago I had no idea if I would ever see. You hope and you pray that you get to this point but at the same time you realize that maybe this is not in the plans for you. This day...this milestone.... is here. I AM HERE DAMMIT!!! I had days where I thought maybe God had another plan for me. But today... I AM HERE!! HELL YES!

Jeff is finishing up his speech and out comes Jeff's mom and dad! Jeff brought his mom, dad, and his uncle who is also his Godfather.

Mia Hamm comes over to me and gives me a big hug. She says, Jason I want to thank you for coming here today and sharing your story with us today. It is truly an inspiring story and I want to thank you for being here today. You have no idea how much this means to me.

I am in total awe here. I am talking with MIA HAMM! She is thanking me??!!?? I utter out the words THANKS and some other stuff that I can't remember...I TOLD YOU I WAS IN AWE!!

Mia then goes over to Tracey and gives her a hug and then Nomar comes over and shakes my hand and says, Jason, thank you for being her today. I can't tell you how much this means to Mia and our family. You are an inspiration......

WWWOOOOWWW ..... Inspiration??? Uhhhhh wow...too kind....

I utter some more things to Nomar but I am so taken by all of this that I have no clue what I said. Nomar then moves over to Tracey and gives her a hug.

At this point I do remember thinking...GEEEZZZ Nomar...where is my hug?!?!?

Tracey got additional hugs from a couple of the ladies from the Woman's Gold Medal socooer team and The GOLD MEDAL winner from the beach volleyball women's team.

My thought was...ladies...ladies..... What about me????? Since I was talking with Jeff's parents I forgave them for this gaffe on their part.

We return to the suits at the HOME DEPOT CENTER and I commence to get to know a bit more about Jeff and his family.

I have had a million questions run through my head over the past year waiting...hoping this day would come. Now that it is here I can't seem to remember most of them. THINK...JDHTEACH...TTTTTTTHHHHHIIIIINNNNKKKKK.....

nope...nothin...empty...I can hear crickets.

I do manage to think of a few and we spend the next hour visiting with Jeff and his family. Jeff's parents are wonderful people and we truly enjoy visiting. The hour goes by so fast I can't believe it is time to go.

The good news is we are all at the same hotel so we ride back together in the limo. Once we arrive we find out that Jeff's parents and Uncle are heading back that evening but Jeff is staying till tomorrow. We say our good byes to Jeff's family and make arrangements to meet Jeff for breakfast the next day.

Tracey and I go to the room and rest up because my sister-in-law are meeting us for dinner.

About an hour later we get a call from Sara informing us that she and her boyfriend Jimmy were in the bar. Tracey and I head down to the bar to find Sara and Jimmy sitting next to Jeff and his family.

As we enter the bar I make eye contact with Sara right when Jeff sees Tracey and I. Jeff's family jumps us and everyone starts hugging again. Sara is looking at me with a slightly confused look on her face. I introduce Sara to Jeff and she gives Jeff a big hug. Sara, not being the shy one, looks at me and says... JDHTEACH you have some FINE bone marrow in you.

Yes...we have established that Jeff is good looking Sara. Jimmy looks at her and says....HEY WHAT ABOUT ME??? I told him to not worry about it. I have one of these (pointing to my wedding ring) and she says it too.

We stay about another hour visiting as a group when Jeff and his family leave. We finalize our plans with Jeff for breakfast in the morning and off they go.

Now for dinner.....We are meeting Tracey's cousin who lives in California ...not far from LA for dinner as well. We go to this Greek restaurant not far from the hotel. Sarah made the reservations.

The area we are in is sort of like lower Greenville or Austin...6th street. You have eating establishment after eating establishment. Each eating establishment has outdoor seating and live music. So as you are walking down the sidewalk you hear all types of music at the same time the smells coming from the restaurants tickles your nose as you smell spice and sweetness.

We get to the restaurant and there is an older Greek gentleman standing at the doorway and when he sees Sara he just starts yelling what I assume is mixed English and Greek. He then begins to hug everyone! Sara, Jimmy, Tracey, Me...I think he tried to hug Doug, Tracey's cousin but Doug is not a huggy guy. We are then shown our table. It is outside. The night air in LA has a nip to it and I can't be in that so I was a bit worried....Then I see that they put us in the covered portion of outside eating area...and they have one of those gas heaters right by our table! PERFECT!! I then notice as I am sitting that there is a bottle of chilled champagne on our table. My immediate thought was...well maybe you get that at a Greek restaurant...like chips and hot sauce at a Mexican joint! Then my thought was...DON'T OPEN IT...WE WILL HAVE TO PAY FOR IT. The waiter then comes over and says to me this....

We are all aware of your story and we feel it is an honor that you are with us tonight. The campaign is on us. Please enjoy.

I looked over at Sara and she saw the look on my face....She just grinned and said...I laid it on PPPPRRREEEETTTYYYYY THICK!!

Sara told them my whole story and they made the special arrangements for me. Now it's all coming together....the covered seating...the heater...

All I could say was thank you.

After a great meal with great conversation we left for the hotel.

As Tracey and I are entering the room all I can think of is getting to sleep. Tracey and I are starting to miss the kids pretty bad by this point. I know it's bad. We have been away for all of 48 hours to this point and all we want to do is see our kids.

As I lay my head down I am just reflecting about everything that has happened to me today. A day that a year ago I did not know I would see has just concluded.

You have red letter day's in your life. Your first bicycle...when you graduate from high school or college...the day you get married...the day your kids are born....and when you meet the person who saves your life....yeah...that is a red letter day.

SUNDAY

Sunday arrives and Tracey and I are ready to get home. We are missing the kids bad. I know ...we suck....

Anyway, we have breakfast with Jeff and off to the airport we go. We get through airport security with about 20 minutes to spare. After sharing a burger we board the plane.

For some reason I am selected to put my bag in the carry on box fitter. It seems my carry on is too big. As they are taking it from me I noticing person after person waling past me with bags bigger than mine.

I felt like the guy that got pulled over for speeding for doing 65 in a 55. Meanwhile everyone is passing my us running 90 as the cop writes me a ticket. I wanted to argue about it but I did not want to end up in AIRPORT JAIL with some guy and a rubber glove with lube about to do a body cavity search so I let it go. I wanted to go home.

Tracey sees me with out the suitcase and up she marches to argue....before I could say anything she was gone....I just got on the plane.

Once on the plane I see all of these people getting on with these huge bags! One guys bag was so big he could not lift it. It took TWO flight attendants to raise into the overhead ben. I just laughed and put on my headphones. In protest I left them on while the flight attendant went though their talk at the beginning of the fight. TAKE THAT AMERICAN!!! I am listening to MMMUUUSSSIIICCCCC nanaaannnannana!

The flight is fine and as we are approaching DFW the pilot has this say.

Um people we are having a slight mechanical issue at this time in that we are losing our hydraulic fluid.

Now my immediate thought was....THAT IS NOT GOOD...THAT IS HOW THEY STEER THIS BABY!

Then the pilot continues...

I want to assure you that this is not a major problem . We have full control of the airplane. At this time we cannot lower our landing gear.

OH SHIT...NOT GOOD.

Let's see...engines are on the tail of the plain not under the wing...CHECK!!!!

Pilot continues:

We are going to have to lower the landing gear manually. Just so you know I am going to circle the airport a couple of times to give us time to get the gear down firmly.

CIRCLE AWAY BUDDY...WE WANT FIRM LANDING GEAR!!!!! were my thoughts.

Tracey looks at me with a oh shit look on her face.

HAS ANYTHING ON THIS TRIP BEEN NORMAL???? was my response to her.

We land safely and hear come the emergency trucks! From a half mile away you can see all of the lights.

We landed but we had now way of steering the plane on the ground. So we were TOWED to our gate.

LANDING ON THE GROUND SAFELY WITH A MALFUNCTIONING PLANE!!! Does that qualify as a second red letter day in a row?

You be the judge.