The airport bar is always worth a stop, even if you don’t drink alcohol. I’ll often show up for a flight extra early to enjoy the ambiance of a bar in an airport terminal, and the people-watching is usually amazing. Sometimes, you meet the most interesting people sitting at an airport bar at eight on a Thursday morning.
A few weeks ago, I had a connecting flight through Washington Dulles and found myself in a crowded bar across from my departure gate. Noticing that the bar was populated primarily by couples who seemed to be leaving for relaxing alcoholic vacations, I grabbed a stool in the corner, with room on both sides, where I was hoping to keep to myself.
I ordered a mimosa, since my conscience believes it is more socially acceptable to drink a mimosa at eight in the morning than an Old Fashioned or a Jägerbomb. However, it started to look like the couples across the bar were already on that track. I wondered where they were going in such lively tropical attire on a wintery December day. Did they work 4/10s and only have to take one day off from work? Cabo? Miami? Maldives? Lucky, happy people!
Speaking of luck though, I had good fortune too, because an old gentleman approached the bar stool to my right just then. He grinned brightly and said something like, “Good morning, darling!” in an upbeat and confident tone, and I knew for sure at that moment it would be a unique hour before my flight. This gentleman didn’t disappoint my introverted intuition whatsoever.
He and his adult daughter, probably in her 50s, were going to Florida to hop on a luxurious cruise to the tropics. As I suspected, everyone but me was on their way somewhere that required a Hawaiian shirt, a sundress, or a floppy hat. I gathered that these two traveled together often and learned from him that his wife had passed away recently. They had been married 58 years, and one of their favorite things to do together was take a cruise. His daughter had also lost her husband, so this was their way of coping with their loss and enjoying their time together now.
When the bartender came to take their order, the daughter said, “Dad, what do you want to drink?”
“Anything with alcohol!” the old man chirped.
He ended up ordering a beer, which he happily sipped as he continued to share with me the unabridged story of his life. He started his career as an attendant in a petrol station and retired as a multi-millionaire with several mines in his name. He sold a car to buy the engagement ring he gave his beloved wife, and when she agreed to marry him, he only had $60 to his credit. He was the epitome of a mid-west American success story.
Then he spilled his beer on me. It went everywhere. Beer covered our area of the bar top, my purse, my sweatshirt, and his jacket, and flowed into his lap like a lazy Hefeweizen river. It looked like someone had emptied an entire pint glass on us.
The old millionaire gentleman apologized profusely, and I commented that I would probably smell like a brewery when I boarded my next flight to Minneapolis. A guy across the bar, sitting with his wife, raised his glass and said proudly, “I always smell like that when I fly!” “I salute you, good Sir,” I replied as we acknowledged this confession.
While we dried off, my barstool companion paid for another mimosa and covered my bill as an apology. He paid in cash from an overstuffed wallet that resembled an extra-large sausage roll. Reflecting on our generational differences, I would feel nervous carrying a wad of hundred-dollar bills around like that. Then everyone hopes you spill your beer on them. People start taking positions and trying to trip you.
The gentleman’s daughter reminded him they had to hurry up, drink faster, and catch their flight to Florida. Before they hurried away, though, my new old friend told me more about his wife, whom he missed more than anything, and that he wouldn’t have been able to accomplish half the things he did without her love and support. It was so sweet, and he even looked like he might cry. He didn’t, though.
My airport bar friend said there is nothing more important than spending time with loved ones, and now he wouldn’t know what to do without his daughter. I told him about my Dad, who has dementia, and how I’m considering taking a career break to become a caregiver for him. It’s been weighing on my soul lately, so I asked him for any advice.
“God will bless you,” he confidently assured me. “You know what to do, and it will work out.” Then, they left for their departure gate.
You do meet the most interesting people in an airport bar. Sometimes, they’re just drunk and obnoxious but thoroughly entertaining, like the overly self-important guy in the United Club who I met a few hours later and who forgot his open MacBook on the bar. The bartender had to go chase him down in the terminal. Missing something, buddy?
Other times, these interactions leave you feeling destined to meet each other and that they served some purpose to help you understand something from the bigger picture of life itself. I will never see that old millionaire gentleman again, but I will remember him and his story of family and love. I hope they had a wonderful cruise and didn’t lose too many of those hundred-dollar bills paying for spilled beers.