The Terror of Tiny Tots

Yesterday I drove my friend Lisa and her son Jake to the airport so they could fly to Arizona for a brief vacation. Jake is a cherub-heeked twenty-two-month old who he smiles a lot. On the drive Jake sat in his car seat and excitedly pointed and yelled whenever a bus or an 18-wheeler passed us on the freeway.

“Bih twuh!” He yelled many times. I interpreted that to mean “Big truck,” although I suppose he could’ve been cursing in toddlerese.

After a twenty-minute drive, we pulled up to Southwest Airline's curbside check-in and I unloaded Lisa’s two big suitcases from the trunk. Lisa unloaded Jake, his stroller and a diaper bag, and strapped onto her back a giant but allegedly portable car seat that appeared to weigh about two hundred pounds. It looked like Lisa was going to spend two weeks climbing Mount Everest, not five days in Phoenix.

She strapped Jake into his stroller, and I followed her Sherpa-like to the curbside ticket counter, suitcases in tow. I stood by while the skycap checked her in. Lisa told him her name and handed him her driver’s license.

“How many passengers?” The skycap asked.

“Two,” said Lisa, indicating Jake.

“What’s his last name?” Lisa hesitated. It did seem like a dumb question, but I suppose it’s possible for someome to be traveling with another person’s child. A kidnapped child, perhaps. Lisa repeated her last name.

“And his first name?”

“Jacob.”

“How old is he?”

“Twenty-two months.” Lisa said.

“Do you have his birth certificate?”

Lisa looked stricken. “Oh, crap!” she said. “I knew I forgot something! No, I didn’t bring it.”

“Do you have any proof that he’s twenty-two months old?”

I looked at Jake. He sat in his stroller, looking around, sucking on his index finger and kicking his feet. In his little red overalls and tiny shoes, he could’ve passed for anywhere between sixteen months and two years old, I guessed. He was definitely way below drinking age.

“No,” Lisa said. “We flew on Southwest this past summer. Do you have any record of that in your system?”

“No,” said the skycap. “You’ll have to go inside to the ticket counter to see if they’ll let him on. I can’t make that call.” Apparently the people at the ticket counter inside the airport wield the real power. “I can check your bags here and you can go on in if you want.”

Lisa was on the verge of tears. The skycap noticed. “Or I can take your bags and go inside with you,” he offered.

“Would you, please? I’d really appreciate it.” Lisa said. She turned to me and gave me a quick hug. “Thanks for driving us.”

“It’ll be fine,” I said, although I didn’t really believe my own reassurance. “Have a good trip.”

I got in the car. I was reluctant to leave not knowing whether Jake would be exiled from the flight and possibly placed on a terrorist toddler watch list, but I had to move the car away from the passenger-loading zone. I exited the airport, driving slowly just in case Lisa called and needed me to come back.

I didn’t see what the big deal was. Jake was obviously a mere tot. The skycap seemed more concerned about Jake’s age than his identity. I recently read a story about a young man from Hong Kong who flew to Canada disguised as an old man. He was not a terrorist, but rather an asylum seeker. Still, his successful disguise caused quite a stir among airline security types.

I think it would be difficult for an adult to disguise himself as a toddler. I suppose an extremely small dwarf might be able to pull it off with tons of makeup and lots of practice cooing, drooling and spitting up. But I mean really--what are the chances?

As I drove away I pictured the geniuses employed by the TSA patting Jake down, searching his Huggies for explosives and asking him trick questions to try to trip him up: “What’s two plus two?” or “Which little piggie went to market?”

“Bih twuh!” Jake would reply, cursing them in his secret language. Perhaps they would raise the National Terror Alert color to Baby-Shit Yellow.

I was about 10 minutes away from the airport when I got a text from Lisa: “Everything should be fine. Jake’s dr. is faxing some documentation.”

I wondered what kind of documentation that would be. Do pediatricians keep mugshots of babies? Fingerprints, perhaps? Would TSA agents be peering through a magnifying glass comparing the whorls and lines on Jake’s tiny fingertips with those faxed over from the pediatrician?

At any rate, I was relieved. Lisa and Jake wouldn’t miss their flight, and the skies were safe from terrorist toddlers for another day.

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