Yesterday Laralee returned from a trip to Salt Lake City to visit her family. She flew, of course. Before she left last week, we were talking about all of the stuff she was packing. She wanted to bring a lemon. Yes, a lemon. Don’t ask me why– I don’t actually know, nor is it relevant to this story.
She was concerned, though, because she wasn’t actually sure if she could bring it. Are lemons some kind of controlled substance? Would the TSA confiscate it? Would they ask questions about it, demanding to know why she wanted a lemon on the plane?
As it turned out, nothing happened and the lemon (thankfully) made it through security. But it made me think about how ridiculous the whole situation was.
Congratulations, terrorists. You won. You’ve left our country in such a state of fear that we don’t even know if a stupid lemon is going to trigger alarms or violate the absurd rules we’ve built around air travel, all in the name of hiding from the bogeyman.