Flourescent shame

There's a certain quiet indignity one feels whilst going through the new D terminal security lines in the Miami airport.

What used to be a relatively painless and speedy operation even during the most crowded holiday rush, has been TSA-ized; that is to say it's been 311'ed and made far more inexplicably inefficient.

Why only three lanes of security were open on the day before one of the busiest travel days of the year was beyond me. Even further beyond me is why, right behind me, they opened up a new line, so that people who were behind me in the security line ended up beating me theough the metal detectors by five minutes... Because they were allowed to bypass the extra 5 minutes I was waiting and allowed directly into the security lane I would have gone through... While the TSA employee joked that they were all under arrest. I guess that whole joking-in-line prohibition doesn't go both ways.

After walking through the smeared blood on the floor, I was allowed to undress myself; undress in front of strangers while an elderly man with a Brooklyn accent and a speech impediment droaned the same speech over and over and over again about making sure one's possessions had gone into the x-ray machine.

Of course, I forgot to take off my shoes, because I was distracted that another TSA employee was trying to butt someone else's wooden legs through the x-ray machine before my wallet and keys. Not bloody likely. Me: 1, Wooden legs: 0.

Finally, fifteen minutes later, the process that used to take 2 minutes, even during Thanksgiving, was complete, and, in bare-socked feet, wondering how many cases of athelete's foot are transmitted daily by that space right in front of the metal detector, I was done.

And I began that process of, eyes cast down at the shame of re-tucking, re-belting,and re-shoeing under the cold, high-lumens flourescent lights, re-assembling myself and getting the hell out of security.

I guess airports win the TSA award of the year by needlessly complicating and making all the more humiliating, an already unpleasant experience. And so I say to you, O Miami International, ye are a raging success!

Disclaimer: I wrote this on my iPhone. I'll make the necessary edits asap.