On the day I was supposed to fly home, the day before Chloe’s surgery, nearly everything that could have gone wrong went wrong. So my grandma and I were supposed to fly out of a relatively small airport in the early afternoon to a large airport for the layover. Almost 20 minutes after we arrived at the gate, we found out the plane we were supposed to take was struck by lightening, so they cancelled our flight. After much confusion we ended up on a later flight on a different airline (without asking us about what options there were) and the person changing our flight made it so we only had a 20 min layover! To make matters worse, the airport we had to fly into has 3 large concourses separated by an underground subway.  Since we still had our original connecting flight (with the other airline) it meant that we had to walk to the middle of the terminal, catch the train and walk to the next gate. I was sweating bullets, constantly worrying that I wouldn’t be able to send Chloe off to her surgery the following morning and was convinced that these were surely bad omens. This later flight took off on time, however we ended up parking at a gate the furthest possible from the train! My grandma and I hoofed it as fast as we could with a 10 min walk to the train, 2 min train ride to the next terminal, and another 3 min walk to our gate. We arrived completely breathless and were so lucky that the plane we needed to take back home was boarding late and managed to literally “walk on” the plane. Oh and did I mention that our bags didn’t make the flight? No surprise there, but they did get delivered the following day. All I really card about was that I had made it. I had overcome flight issues and would be there for Chloe.

During the drive back home (almost 9pm), I was remarking at how lucky this whole thing turned out. Not just the fact that I would get to see her that night one last time with 4 legs and would see her off tomorrow, but that she started showing the cancer at a time when I was starting summer vacation. Plus I am the one who saw it and the one who has the time to spend all day every day during her recovery. For such a rare cancer and unfortunate occurrence, it certainly had impeccable timing.

The next morning I put her in her harness and got her set up in my car with the back window down so she could stick her head out on the way to the vet. However, when I got into my car I saw that something or someone cracked my windshield! Mind you I live in a small, tight nit, safe community and my car was not parked under any tree, so it was most likely kids doing something stupid. Still, I couldn’t help thinking maybe this was another bad sign, that maybe a difficulty would occur during her procedure (I am such a worry wart). I just had to keep reminding myself that she is remarkably healthy for her condition and that I will be here for her. Maybe my luck hadn’t yet run out.

After dropping her off at the vets office at 7:30 am, I started the nerve racking 6.5 hr wait for news about her surgery and condition…