Passport Hell

I am one of the many who are biting their fingernails and praying for their passport to arrive on time. I applied for my passport just when thing began to get hairy and the floodgates opened with the applications pouring in from people trying to get a passport to travel to Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean.

At the time I offered to pay the additional amount of money to have my passport expedited. I was assured that this was absolutely not necessary. I had more then ample time to receive my passport. So did my daughter as well as my step son and daughter in law.

With our travel dates closely approaching we began calling the passport office as we were traveling in the next 14 days so apparently they would allow us to talk to the customer service reps. I do use that term lightly. Not because they didn't want to be helpful.....they just had no information they could give us.

The best suggestion they had was to try to make an appointment at the regional offices located in Boston, Norwalk, Washington D.C., Philly and NYC. Impossible.... there were no appointments available never mind it was going to be hard to take extra time off from work to travel to these destinations when I am already taking time off for the trip. These agents, whom I am sure are getting used to dishing out a somewhat bleak picture regarding actually getting your passport on time, told us just that. It probably was not going to happen.

I confess that with my step-son getting married and then going back for his second tour to Iraq, I wasn't much in the mood to hear that news and so I did reach out to my State Representatives and Senators.

They have actually been very responsive and are trying to help. My step son and his wife who live in Florida and were also working with their local congressman received their passports today....they leave Monday. I have been told I will be receiving my passport tomorrow as will my daughter. I will not completely relax until I have it in my hands.

They have relaxed the rules a bit allowing for those traveling to Mexico, Canada and the Caribbean to print out a confirmation stating they are in the application process. That and picture ID will get you on your flight.

As I am going to Europe I have to have the real deal. The conversations I have had with the myriad CSRs as well as the information I have been getting has really done nothing more than create a sense of frustration. I was advised more often than not that they really couldn't tell me where I was in the process. Not that they didn't know, they just were not allowed to tell.

So for today I keep holding the picture of me sitting on the plane, passport in hand on my way to London. Quite exciting as I have never travelled anywhere as yet that required me having a passport.