I was exiting the train at Chicago Midway airport on Friday afternoon. The woman ahead of me had one of those rolling carry on bags. She walked up to the waist high turnstile and tried to go through. Clunk. Uh-oh. The bag was too wide to fit! Now what was she going to do? After a puzzled second, she hit on the obvious solution. She stepped back a few paces, and strode briskly forward with great determination. CLUNK! Well, my goodness. How could this be? The bag was still too wide! But how? Hadnt she walked forward briskly and with great determination? Hadnt she always been told that you can accomplish anything as long as you were determined enough? Well, she wasnt going to be deterred! She had the American can-do spirit. Never give up. Persevere! Where theres a will theres a way! Remember the Alamo! If at first you dont succeed.....Clunk......Clunk....CLUNK!....CLUNK! CLUNK!......CLUNK! CLUNK! CLUNK!....CLUNKCLUNKCLUNKCLUNKCLUNKCLUNK! Whew! This was a tough one! Even after all of her never-say-die effort, the bag was still too wide.

At this point her brave front crumpled, and I watched as she humiliated herself by knocking the bag sideways and dragging it through the opening, hunched over like a crab and shoving the metal turnstile out of the way with her shoulder. This whole event was made all the more pathetic as it had apparently never occurred to her to LIFT THE BAG OVER!

A sad ( and true) story indeed. Am I the only one who sees political and social parallels here?