Paris: Day 5-February 2, 2015

This trip was now supposed to be over. (haha) We got up around 3am and grabbed our stuff and headed to the airport. After standing in line we finally were able to make our way to the counter to haggle any kind of confirmed seats we could find to Dallas. No such luck. Then Judson had this brilliant idea for her to check flights to Austin. She looked at us smiling and said “you two are probably the luckiest people in this entire airport. I have two seats to Austin at noon.” We felt so much relief. Then I looked at him and said but what are we going to do when we get to Austin? He quickly answered that our friend Kevin keeps a car at the other airport in Austin so we can just take an Uber. If that didn’t work at least we were close enough someone could come get us or we could rent a car. This was fine by me! I just didn’t want to spend another night in Chicago. We got our boarding passes, went through security and found our gate. I grabbed us some breakfast and coffee because it was still pretty early. Our flight was delayed several times. We tried a couple of times to fly stand by to DFW not giving up our booked seats to Austin. We passed the time by picking out save the dates, invitations and tuxedos. We almost completed our whole guest list. Then finally a few hours after we were supposed to leave, we were boarding and going home (at least to Texas).  We had separate seats and if I remember correctly a couple of hours apart from one another was probably a good thing! It had been a pretty stressful 24 hours. After what seemed like the longest flight we landed in Austin. Judson requested an Uber and about 10 minutes later we were headed to Austin Executive.

We finally got there and walk out to the car only to find a major flat tire. By this point I am just starting to feel like we may never get back to Chico. Luckily, the airport can fix the tire for us. Judson grabs the hidden key and starts to unlock my door. As he is trying to force the key into the lock it breaks in half. He only then realized that this was the ignition key! I look at him with what were probably the widest most sad eyes and he said “do not cry.” Judson calls Kevin and he suggests hot wiring the car or jamming the broken part of the key into the ignition and the inserting the rest.  As luck would have it once again the latter actually worked! The airport maintenance worker was able to jam the key and start the car. I was so thrilled, amazed, grateful all at the same time. We drove the car over and he aired up the tire. We drove that car from Austin to Chico with a broken key and a leaking tire. We never turned the car off when we had to stop for fuel and food and we never turned the radio on. We spent 4 hours driving and talking and laughing. We discussed our crazy weekend getaway to Paris. We told each other stories and discussed plans for our new journey in life together. Sometime around midnight we made it home. Judson slept for a few hours before leaving for Judge School around 4 am. I know he was so exhausted and I am so grateful that he had a safe drive.

The whole weekend was a crazy whirlwind full of highs and lows. I think it shows a lot that we didn’t stress out and lose our cool with each other. We teamed up and made the most of it. Looking back I wouldn’t change one single thing about it. I am so excited that I get to spend the rest of my life going on crazy adventures with this guy. He is my favorite part of every single day.