D-Day

Never have I felt more of a failure in my job as I did today. Today was moving day for my Italian lady. She moved from the balmy 23 degrees of the mid Atlantic to the scorching 73 degrees of Florida. She left against her will & yet, the same time, peacefully.

The airport & plane ride were not an issue, yet as soon as we got to baggage claim things started going wrong. We had a porter, (a new experience for me) so I thought this would go smoothly. One bag came quickly, the other took forever & belonged to a gang; there were what felt like a dozen others that looked just like it. Finally we pulled out the correct bag & off we go to the taxi stand. They hail us a cab & start putting our bags in a Suburban faster than I know what's happening. My lady is too short & not limber enough for the front seat. We almost have to pick her up to get her in. I give the address & off we go. We get less than 5 minutes from the airport & my lady starts flipping out! Going off in Italian (of which I speak little), & I can tell she thinks we're going the wrong way. I'm following our route on the GPS & it looks fine to me. The cabby explains the other route is under construction & not advisable. She's going ballistic!! I've never seen her like this. For the entire ride she rants & raves, yet I know he's not leading us off to the swamps of Florida because I'm still following on the GPS. For the first time EVER, I yell at her. I've never done this before. For 15 minutes she rants, raves, cusses, & prays. FINALLY, we get to the area the house is in, but can't figure out which house it is that we belong too. (I've never been there). We eventually figure it out & pull into the drive way. The whole time she's bitching out the cabby & myself. I felt awful, can't imagine what the cabby felt. We unload & get inside, only for her to continue bitching while she's on the toilet!!!! Seriously!!!! She's bitching about the cabby & me in Italian to me while sitting on the shitter!!!! I literally wanted to cry! I had to stop myself from losing it. I've only felt this way w/ my children when they are sick & I couldn't make them better, or when my oldest who's Autistic, had a meltdown. I had to stop thinking about myself & think:

I knew she didn't want to be here;
I knew she was exhausted;
I knew she was mad;
I knew she was beyond frustrated.

So there was nothing I could do but apologize & put her in her pajamas, feed her, & put her to bed.

Now, here it is 5 hours later & thanks to some time, food, & rum I'm a little more settled & hope tomorrow will be a better day.