Before I begin what I’m about to say, I would like to point out that I am absolutely aware that the problems I talk about here are not exactly life-or-death situations, and I am very fortunate that I was able to get home relatively easily.

In the airport, I have anxiety about every step. Is it rational? Of course not. Why do I think that TSA is going to stop me and search my stuff and not let me get on my flight? I have done nothing wrong and I do not plan to. The most malicious thing about me is a foundation bottle that is more than 3.4 oz of liquid.

Going down to my gate, I had anxiety that I would not be able to board on time. I had anxiety that I would lose my checked bag. I had anxiety that the person I was going to sit next to would be weird or harass me. Did any of this happen? Of course not. But my brain wants me to think that, for some reason. Whether it is to add some spice to my life or to make me realize that I should shut up because these situations aren’t bad, it still happens on a daily basis.

So when my second flight, the flight that was supposed to take me home in 37 minutes to my mom and my dad and my two fluffy cats, was canceled, my anxiety shot up. How was I going to deal with this? I had flown alone before, but that was in good weather and not in the holiday season.

I got in line to speak to a customer service agent, and I realized it was going to take an incredibly long time to get up there. With about ten people ahead of me, I heard the agent say “there are no more flights to Redmond for three more days”. This was followed by a series of gasps from the other people in line with me, and then a frantic rush to get on their cell phones and call their most knowledgeable relative.

In that moment, I wanted to cry. Ugly cry. Tears of “I’m just a kid, let me go home”. Then my friend sent me some Vladimir Putin memes and I once again was reminded of our imminent threat of a breakdown of international relations with Trump as president...and my anxiety somehow was lessened.

I stood in line for a full hour before I got fed up with standing in my own sweat and listening to a racist old man in a NAPA hat go on and on about the “negroes”. I called the customer service line, taking the route of “in a normal situation I would be far too nervous to make a phone call but because of the impending doom and anxiousness this is nothing”.

Within ten minutes I was on another flight. As of now, it seems that I will board that flight and get to my aunt and uncle’s house in a few hours. So in the end, after waiting in the airport for almost 7 hours with some Chex mix and a bottle water, I was fine. It makes me think how I would have acted in this situation if I didn’t have anxiety.

Would I have waited to talk to the customer service representative in line? Would I have gotten a hotel? Would I have gotten a friend to pick me up? Would I have slept in the airport?

But after all of this, after I have calmed down, I realize that my near anxiety attack in the Portland airport was pointless. I was fine in the end, and I did not face any deadly situations. I was still able to find another flight, and I have the privilege to be able to do that without extreme difficult. If I was in another airport, on another flight, it may have been much more difficult.

As I am experiencing the madness that is and airport during the holiday season, I realize that my fears needed to stop (if I could make them stop, that is). First of all, this was not a horrible situation and nothing bad except for a canceled flight happened. The amount of anxiety I had about this ending badly was normal for me, but it made me upset at myself that I let such a minor situation get to me.

This being said, clearly other people were upset. A very round man in a very bright Pendleton designed vest was screaming at a customer service agent, and another bearded man in a fedora was screaming too. People were so upset at this cancellation, and it makes sense. We want to see our families, and we want to go home for the holidays. We want to travel easily and we don’t want road bumps (or turbulence, for this analogy).

The situation I experienced is nothing compared to the experiences that people face in other parts of the world. Flying is a luxury, and it is easily available to people living in rich countries. This problem I faced, the problem of waiting, is nothing. It did not hurt me or my family, and it did not seriously affect my future.

It might be weird coming from me, your friendly neighborhood pessimist, but when you get stuck in crappy situations like this, it’s much easier to see the positive side to the situation. Or to at least say “hey, I didn’t die today, that’s good”. Being rude to the employees at the airport doesn’t help anybody. It makes them more stressed, it makes you look like an asshole, if I’m being honest, and in the end, it doesn’t change anything. The employees don’t have any control over canceling flights or delaying flights.

The employees get handed these horrible announcements all day that they have to make, especially during the holidays, and they deal with angry people screaming at them all day. To get through my anxiety attack or episode, or whatever you would like to call it, I tried to think of the other people around me and what they must be feeling. I tried to remind myself that this is not just affecting me, and that the hundreds of people around me are feeling similar things. It was also highly likely that someone else in that line with me was on the verge of a breakdown after hearing that news.

So next time you’re in an airport and your flight gets delayed or canceled, just remember a few things: be nice to the employees, they’re having a rough time too. Be nice to the people around you, they share your feelings. Deal with the situation you are given and recover from it, because in the end, you will get where you need to be. The best way to deal with this is to crack some jokes and realize it’s not the worst thing in the world. You’re still breathing, and there are still good things going for you. It’s easy to focus on the negative, but recognize that you could be in a much worse situation and the sit