Gate 22: A Story of Chaos, Courage, and Quiet Justice
Chapter 1: The Storm Arrives
My name is Elena Rodriguez, and I’ve been traveling for work for fifteen years. I’ve seen it all—delayed flights, lost luggage, crying babies, drunk passengers, and every variety of human behavior that emerges when people are tired, stressed, and crammed into uncomfortable spaces together. But nothing, absolutely nothing, had prepared me for what I witnessed on that Tuesday afternoon at JFK Airport.
I was heading to Rome for a photography assignment—a month-long project documenting the restoration of ancient frescoes in Vatican City. It was the kind of assignment that justified the long hours I’d been putting in as a freelance travel photographer, the kind that might finally give me the financial stability to buy the small studio apartment I’d been dreaming of in Brooklyn.
The flight was scheduled to depart at 6:30 PM, which meant I had arrived at the airport by 3:00 PM to ensure I had plenty of time to navigate the usual chaos. JFK on a Tuesday afternoon in November was exactly what you’d expect—crowded, noisy, and filled with the particular brand of tension that comes when hundreds of people are trying to get somewhere important on schedules that rarely align with reality.
I had made it through security without incident and was wandering toward my gate when I first heard the voice.
“Yeah, yeah, I told her I wasn’t gonna do that. It’s not my job. I don’t care if she cries about it. Some people need to learn that the world doesn’t revolve around their feelings.”
The voice was loud, sharp, and completely without consideration for the dozens of people trying to have their own conversations, read their books, or simply exist in peace around her. I looked toward the source and saw a woman who appeared to be in her early forties, with perfectly styled blonde hair, expensive-looking clothes, and the kind of confident posture that suggested she was used to being the center of attention.
She was standing near the Hudson News store, holding her phone directly in front of her face, conducting what appeared to be a FaceTime call at full volume. No headphones, no attempt to lower her voice, no acknowledgment that she was in a public space shared with hundreds of other people.
But what really caught my attention wasn’t her phone call—it was the small white dog at her feet.
The dog was adorable, I’ll give her that. It looked like a Maltese or perhaps a Pomeranian mix, with fluffy white fur and a collar that sparkled with what appeared to be genuine rhinestones. It was the kind of dog that would normally attract cooing and compliments from passersby.
Except at that moment, the dog was squatting directly in the middle of the terminal walkway, doing its business while travelers streamed around the growing mess.
I stopped walking, certain that the woman would notice what was happening and handle the situation. Surely she had bags for this kind of thing. Surely she would clean up after her pet. Surely she understood that this was completely unacceptable behavior in an international airport.
But she didn’t notice. Or if she did notice, she didn’t care.
An elderly man in a tan baseball cap and a cardigan approached her hesitantly. He was probably in his seventies, with the careful movements of someone who had learned to navigate the world gently.
“Excuse me, miss?” he said politely, pointing toward her dog. “I think your little friend here might need some attention.”
The woman glanced down, saw what her dog had done, and then looked back at the man with an expression of pure annoyance.
“Some people are so damn rude,” she said loudly into her phone, not bothering to lower her voice or step away from the elderly man. “Ugh, this random guy is standing here staring at me like I just committed murder or something. Mind your business, Grandpa.”
The elderly man’s face flushed red, and I saw his shoulders sag slightly. He looked around as if hoping someone else would step in, but most people were hurrying past, trying to avoid the confrontation.
A woman with two young children had stopped nearby, and she spoke up with the kind of firm politeness that mothers master when dealing with difficult situations.
“Ma’am, you really need to clean that up. There are children around, and this is a public space.”
The blonde woman finally ended her phone call, but only so she could give her full attention to being dismissive.
“They have people for that,” she said with a wave of her hand, as if discussing the weather. “It’s not my problem.”
She clipped a jeweled leash onto her dog’s collar and began walking away, leaving the mess exactly where it was.
The silence that followed was deafening. I looked around at the faces of the people who had witnessed this exchange—shock, disgust, disbelief. A janitor had appeared with a mop and cleaning supplies, shaking his head as he began to address the mess that someone else had refused to clean up.
“I can’t believe that just happened,” said a young woman standing near me.
“Welcome to modern society,” replied an older gentleman with a resignation that suggested he’d seen too much of this kind of behavior.
I continued toward my gate, but I couldn’t shake the image of that elderly man’s face when the woman had called him “Grandpa” with such contempt. There was something about casual cruelty that bothered me more than dramatic confrontations. It was the everyday dismissal of other people’s dignity that felt most corrosive to the basic social contract we all supposedly shared.
Twenty minutes later, I found myself in the TSA PreCheck line, and there she was again.
Chapter 2: The Escalation
The woman with the white dog was now causing a scene at the security checkpoint, and it was clear that her behavior in the main terminal had not been an isolated incident.
She had somehow managed to position herself at the front of the regular security line, despite obviously not having been there when I arrived. Her large designer tote bag was sprawled across the conveyor belt, taking up space meant for multiple passengers, while she argued with the TSA agent about procedures that applied to everyone except, apparently, her.
“I have PreCheck,” she was saying in the same loud, authoritative voice I’d heard during her phone call. “And my dog gets anxious in crowds. We need to go through immediately.”
The TSA agent, a patient-looking woman in her fifties, pointed toward the other side of the security area. “Ma’am, PreCheck is that line over there. You’ll need to move over there if you have PreCheck clearance.”
“I’m not moving,” the woman replied. “I’m already here, and I’m going through this line. Figure it out.”
People behind her in line were beginning to murmur among themselves. A businessman checked his watch and shook his head. A family with young children looked stressed about the delay. The white dog was barking at seemingly random intervals, adding to the general chaos.
“Ma’am, I’m going to need you to follow the established procedures,” the TSA agent said, maintaining her professional composure despite the obvious frustration.
“Do you know who I am?” the woman demanded, though she didn’t actually provide any identifying information. “I’m not standing in another line. This is ridiculous.”
The standoff continued for several more minutes, during which time the woman threatened to call her lawyer, demanded to speak to a supervisor, and loudly proclaimed that this was the worst airport she’d ever been to. Eventually, she must have realized that her theatrics weren’t going to change TSA protocols, because she huffed and puffed her way over to the correct line.
But that wasn’t the end of it.
When she finally reached the front of the PreCheck line, she refused to remove her shoes.
“These are TSA-friendly,” she announced, pointing to what were clearly knee-high leather boots with multiple buckles and metal details.
“Those are boots, ma’am,” the agent explained patiently. “All boots need to be removed.”
“They’re slip-ons,” she insisted, despite the obvious fact that they had laces and required significant effort to remove.
“I’m going to need you to take off your shoes,” the agent repeated.
“This is discrimination,” the woman declared. “I’m going to sue this entire airport.”
The dog, apparently picking up on its owner’s agitation, began barking more frantically. Other passengers were now openly staring, some taking out their phones to record the spectacle.
Eventually, after holding up the line for nearly ten minutes, she removed her boots, threw them dramatically into the plastic bin, and stomped through the metal detector while muttering under her breath about incompetent government employees and violated constitutional rights.
I made it through security in the normal amount of time and headed toward my gate, hoping I wouldn’t encounter this woman again. But as I walked through the terminal, I could hear her voice echoing from various shops and restaurants, always engaged in some form of complaint or confrontation.
At the Starbucks near Gate 15, I heard her berating a barista about the type of milk they had available.
“I specifically said almond milk,” she was shouting. “Are you deaf? Do you not understand English?”
“I’m very sorry,” the young barista replied, clearly trying to remain professional. “We’re currently out of almond milk. I can offer you oat milk or soy milk as alternatives.”
“I don’t want alternatives! I want what I ordered!”
“We can certainly refund your money,” another employee offered, stepping in to help defuse the situation.
“Forget it,” the woman snapped, grabbing her drink and storming away. “You people are completely incompetent. No wonder this country is falling apart.”
As she left the coffee shop, I noticed she was playing music from her phone’s speaker—not through headphones, but directly from the device, forcing everyone around her to listen to whatever playlist she had selected. The music was loud enough to compete with the general airport noise, and she seemed completely oblivious to the fact that other people might not want to hear it.
I also noticed that she was allowing her dog to wander freely, sniffing at other people’s luggage, jumping on strangers, and generally behaving in ways that would have been inappropriate even in a dog park, much less an international airport.
By the time I reached Gate 22, where my flight to Rome would be departing, I was genuinely hoping that this woman was traveling to a different destination. Surely the universe wouldn’t subject an entire plane full of passengers to a transatlantic flight with someone who seemed incapable of basic consideration for others.
But of course, there she was.
Chapter 3: The Final Straw
Gate 22 was a large waiting area with several rows of connected chairs and a clear view of the runway where our plane would eventually arrive. It was about 4:30 in the afternoon, which meant we still had two hours before boarding would begin, but many passengers had already arrived and settled in for the wait.
The atmosphere was relatively peaceful when I first arrived. People were reading, working on laptops, having quiet conversations, or simply resting after navigating the challenges of getting through the airport. It was the kind of calm, communal space that makes travel bearable—strangers sharing a common goal and respecting each other’s need for peace and quiet.
Then she arrived.
The woman with the white dog entered the gate area like a one-person tornado, immediately claiming three seats for herself, her belongings, and her pet. She spread out as if she owned the entire space, placing her large purse on one chair, propping her feet up on another, and allowing her dog to sprawl across a third.
Within minutes, she was back on her phone, conducting another loud FaceTime call that forced everyone in the vicinity to listen to her personal business.
“I told Marcus that if he thinks he can get away with that kind of behavior, he’s got another thing coming,” she announced to whoever was on the other end of her call. “I have documentation of everything, and my lawyer says we have a slam-dunk case.”
The dog was barking intermittently, apparently triggered by the movement of other passengers. Every time someone walked past with rolling luggage, the dog would erupt in a series of sharp, high-pitched barks that echoed through the gate area.
I watched as a young mother with a toddler approached the seating area, clearly hoping to find a place where her child could sit comfortably. When the dog began barking at the toddler, the child started crying, and the mother quickly moved to a different section of the gate.
An elderly couple who had been sitting across from the woman got up and relocated after the dog barked at the man’s walking cane for several minutes straight. They moved slowly and carefully, clearly uncomfortable with the disruption but too polite to complain directly.
“This is unbelievable,” I heard someone mutter.
“Is she really going to be on our flight?” another passenger whispered to their companion.
The general mood in the gate area was shifting from peaceful anticipation to tense resignation. People were looking around at each other with expressions that seemed to ask, “Are we really going to have to endure this for the next eight hours?”
I found myself thinking about all the times I had witnessed inconsiderate behavior and done nothing about it. All the moments when someone’s rudeness had made a shared space uncomfortable for everyone, and I had simply moved away or tried to ignore it. All the occasions when I had told myself that it wasn’t my responsibility to address someone else’s bad behavior.
But sitting there, watching this woman turn a peaceful gate area into her personal kingdom while dozens of other travelers suffered in silence, I felt something shift inside me.
My mother had been a elementary school teacher for thirty-five years before she retired. She had dealt with every kind of difficult behavior imaginable, from playground bullies to helicopter parents to administrators who didn’t understand children. But she had always approached these challenges with a combination of firmness and creativity that I had admired.
“The key to dealing with difficult people,” she used to tell me, “is to remember that they’re usually acting out because they feel powerless about something else in their lives. But that doesn’t mean you have to let them make everyone else miserable. Sometimes you have to be clever about how you handle the situation.”
I thought about my mother’s words as I watched the blonde woman continue her reign of terror at Gate 22. The other passengers looked exhausted—not just from travel, but from having to navigate around someone who seemed determined to make their journey as unpleasant as possible.
That’s when I made my decision.
I stood up from my seat and walked directly over to the woman, settling into the chair right next to her with a friendly smile.
She looked at me suspiciously, clearly not accustomed to people voluntarily positioning themselves in her vicinity.
“Long wait, huh?” I said conversationally, as if we were old friends meeting for coffee.
She glanced at me sideways, her phone call pausing as she tried to figure out what I was up to. The dog immediately began barking at me, apparently viewing my presence as some kind of threat.
“He doesn’t like strangers,” she said dismissively, not bothering to control her pet or apologize for the noise.
“I totally understand,” I replied, maintaining my friendly tone. “Airports can be really stressful for animals. All these crowds and strange sounds and smells.”
She seemed momentarily thrown off by my reasonable response, as if she had been expecting me to complain or move away. She went back to her phone call, but I noticed she was speaking slightly less loudly, perhaps unconsciously adjusting her volume because I was sitting so close.
I pulled out my own phone and began scrolling through it casually, as if I was just another passenger killing time before our flight. But I was actually developing a plan—one that my mother would have been proud of.
Chapter 4: The Art of Misdirection
I sat quietly for about ten minutes, listening to the woman’s ongoing phone conversation and observing the general dynamic of the gate area. Other passengers were still giving her a wide berth, clustering in seats far away from her claimed territory. The dog continued to bark sporadically, and she continued to play music from her phone speaker without any apparent awareness of how it was affecting others.
During this time, I noticed several important details that would be crucial to my plan.
First, the woman seemed to have a very casual relationship with factual accuracy. During her phone call, she made several claims that were obviously exaggerated or completely fabricated. She talked about having “fifty-seven thousand followers” on an Instagram account that I could see clearly showed fewer than three thousand. She described a restaurant experience as “the worst service in the history of dining” because they had brought her the wrong appetizer. She claimed to have “connections at the highest levels” of various industries without providing any specific details that would support these assertions.
Second, she appeared to be someone who acted first and asked questions later. When her dog’s leash got tangled around the chair leg, she yanked it free without checking to see if she had damaged anything. When she needed more space for her belongings, she simply moved other people’s items without asking permission. When she wanted to charge her phone, she unplugged someone else’s device from the wall outlet and plugged in her own.
Third, and most importantly, she seemed to have a very high opinion of her own intelligence while demonstrating remarkably poor judgment about basic social situations. She clearly thought she was outsmarting the people around her, but she was actually just bulldozing through normal social conventions without any awareness of how her behavior appeared to others.
These observations gave me confidence that my plan would work.
At exactly 5:15 PM, I stood up and stretched, walking a few feet away from our seating area as if I needed to move around after sitting for too long. I made sure she noticed me getting up, then wandered over toward the large windows that overlooked the runway.
I spent a few minutes there, checking my phone and appearing to read something with interest. Then I walked back toward the seating area, but instead of sitting down immediately, I lingered near the gate counter as if I was looking for information.
Finally, I returned to my seat next to the woman, who was still engaged in her loud phone conversation. I sat down with a slightly concerned expression and pulled out my phone again.
“Excuse me,” I said politely, interrupting her call. “Are you flying to Rome?”
She looked annoyed at being interrupted, but answered, “Obviously. That’s what this gate is for.”
“Oh, weird,” I said, looking down at my phone as if I had just received new information. “I just got a notification that they moved the Rome flight to Gate 14B. They’re using this gate for the Paris flight now.”
I held up my phone as if showing her the alert, though of course there was no such notification.
She frowned and looked up at the departure board above the gate counter, which still clearly displayed “ROME – ON TIME” in bright letters.
“That doesn’t make sense,” she said. “The board still says Rome.”
“Yeah, I know,” I replied, continuing to look at my phone. “But you know how these airlines are. They probably haven’t updated the display yet. The notification I got says all Rome passengers need to report to Gate 14B immediately for rebooking. Something about a gate change due to aircraft maintenance.”
I was careful to include just enough specific details to make the story seem plausible, while also playing into her existing belief that airports and airlines were incompetent organizations that couldn’t be trusted to manage basic logistics.
She looked at the departure board again, then at her phone, then back at me.
“Are you sure?” she asked.
“I mean, that’s what the alert says,” I replied with a shrug. “But you should probably check with the gate agent to be sure. Though honestly, if they just changed it, she might not have been notified yet either. You know how these things go.”
The woman’s expression shifted from confusion to irritation, which I recognized as her default response to any situation that didn’t go exactly according to her preferences.
“This is ridiculous,” she said, ending her phone call abruptly. “This airport is completely incompetent. No one here knows what they’re doing.”
She began gathering her belongings with the kind of aggressive efficiency that suggested she was used to having to solve problems that other people had created. Her dog, picking up on her agitation, began barking more frequently.
“Gate 14B is pretty far from here,” I added helpfully. “You’ll probably want to hurry if you want to get a good seat.”
“Unbelievable,” she muttered, stuffing items into her oversized purse. “Just absolutely unbelievable. I’m definitely writing a complaint letter about this whole experience.”
She clipped the leash onto her dog’s collar and stood up, looking around the gate area one final time as if memorizing details for her future complaint.
“Thanks for letting me know,” she said to me, though her tone suggested she was more annoyed at having to be grateful than actually appreciative of the information.
“No problem,” I replied with a smile. “Good luck!”
And with that, she was gone, marching toward the terminal’s main walkway with her dog trotting beside her and her voice already rising as she began another phone call about the incompetence of airport personnel.
Chapter 5: The Sweet Sound of Silence
The transformation in the gate area was immediate and remarkable.
As soon as the woman and her dog disappeared around the corner, it was as if someone had lifted a heavy blanket of tension from the entire space. The constant background noise of barking, loud phone conversations, and intrusive music simply stopped, replaced by the normal, comfortable hum of an airport gate where people were peacefully waiting for their flight.
I watched as passengers who had been clustered in distant corners began to move back toward the prime seating areas near the gate counter. The elderly couple who had been driven away by the barking dog returned to their original seats, looking visibly relieved. The young mother with the toddler found a comfortable spot where her child could play quietly without being terrorized by an aggressive pet.
The overall mood shift was palpable. People were no longer tense and watchful, constantly bracing themselves for the next disruption. Instead, they were relaxing into their wait, having normal conversations, and treating each other with the basic courtesy that makes shared public spaces functional.
A few minutes after the woman left, a young businessman who had been sitting across the aisle caught my eye and nodded with a slight smile, as if acknowledging that something significant had just happened. A woman reading a paperback novel looked up and mouthed “thank you” in my direction.
But it was the elderly gentleman in the tan baseball cap—the same man who had been called “Grandpa” with such contempt earlier—who provided the most gratifying response. He had apparently witnessed the entire exchange, and as he walked past my seat on his way to the restroom, he paused and leaned down slightly.
“Well done,” he said quietly, with a twinkle in his eye that suggested he understood exactly what had just transpired. “Sometimes a little creative problem-solving is exactly what a situation calls for.”
I smiled and nodded, feeling a warm glow of satisfaction that had nothing to do with personal revenge and everything to do with the restoration of basic human decency to a shared space.
About fifteen minutes later, a gate agent appeared at the counter to make an announcement about our flight. She looked around the waiting area, and I noticed her expression of mild surprise at how calm and orderly everything appeared.
“Good afternoon, passengers on Flight 447 to Rome,” she began. “We’re pleased to announce that boarding will begin on time at 5:45 PM. We’ll start with first class and business class passengers, followed by premium economy and main cabin passengers.”
A small cheer went up from the gate area—not because the news was particularly exciting, but because people were genuinely pleased to be part of a normal, functional travel experience.
As we began the boarding process, I found myself in line behind the elderly couple who had been disturbed by the dog. The woman turned to her husband and said, “You know, Harold, I was really dreading this flight. But now I’m actually looking forward to it.”
“Me too, Martha,” he replied. “Sometimes it just takes one person to make all the difference.”
I pretended not to hear this exchange, but I felt a deep sense of satisfaction knowing that these lovely people would be able to enjoy their journey to Rome without being subjected to eight hours of chaos and inconsideration.
As I found my seat on the plane—23A, a window seat with a perfect view of the runway—I reflected on what had just happened. I had essentially lied to a stranger to trick her into leaving the gate area, which could certainly be viewed as deceptive behavior.
But I had also used that deception to restore peace and comfort to dozens of other travelers who had been suffering in silence. I had given the elderly gentleman back his dignity, the young mother back her ability to travel comfortably with her child, and everyone else the basic courtesy they deserved when using a shared public space.
Most importantly, I had learned something valuable about the power of creative problem-solving when traditional approaches fail. Sometimes, when someone is determined to make life miserable for everyone around them, the best response isn’t confrontation or complaint—it’s clever misdirection that allows natural consequences to unfold.
Chapter 6: Lessons in Applied Psychology
The flight to Rome was everything that air travel should be when people treat each other with basic consideration. Passengers helped each other with overhead luggage, parents managed their children thoughtfully, and conversations were conducted at appropriate volumes. It was, in other words, completely unremarkable—which made it perfect.
I spent most of the eight-hour flight working on my photography equipment and reviewing my notes for the Vatican project, but I also found myself thinking about the psychological dynamics that had played out at Gate 22.
The woman with the white dog had been operating under the assumption that her needs and preferences were more important than anyone else’s. This isn’t necessarily malicious—many people go through life with a kind of unconscious self-centeredness that they’ve never been forced to examine. But the effect on everyone around her had been the same regardless of her intentions.
What interested me most was how quickly the situation had resolved once I provided her with a plausible reason to leave that didn’t challenge her fundamental worldview. I hadn’t confronted her about her behavior or tried to shame her into acting differently. Instead, I had given her an opportunity to be the victim of institutional incompetence—a role she was clearly comfortable playing.
In some ways, this approach had been more respectful of her agency than direct confrontation would have been. I had allowed her to make her own choice based on information that she believed to be accurate, rather than trying to force her to change her behavior through social pressure or authority.
Of course, the information I had provided was completely fabricated, which raised interesting ethical questions about the means I had used to achieve my goal. Was deception justified when it served a greater good? Was my lie qualitatively different from her lies about having “connections at the highest levels” or “fifty-seven thousand followers”?
I wasn’t entirely sure about the answers to these questions, but I was certain about the results. Dozens of travelers had been able to enjoy a peaceful journey because one disruptive person had been convinced to remove herself from the situation. The greater good had been served, even if the means had been somewhat questionable.
When we landed in Rome the next morning, I overheard several passengers talking about what a pleasant flight it had been. A family with young children mentioned how nice it was to travel without worrying about their kids disturbing other passengers. A group of elderly travelers talked about how refreshing it was to see people being considerate of each other.
None of them knew about the drama that had unfolded at Gate 22, but all of them had benefited from its resolution.
As I made my way through customs and immigration at Leonardo da Vinci Airport, I found myself wondering what had happened to the woman with the white dog. Had she eventually realized that there was no gate change? Had she tried to board a flight to Paris? Had she spent the night in the airport, furious at the incompetence of airline personnel who couldn’t keep their gate assignments straight?
Part of me felt a tiny twinge of guilt about the inconvenience I had caused her. But a larger part of me felt satisfied that her inconvenience had been self-imposed, the result of her own failure to verify information that seemed suspicious. And the most honest part of me acknowledged that I felt absolutely no remorse about protecting dozens of innocent travelers from eight hours of misery.
Chapter 7: The Ripple Effect
My first week in Rome was dedicated to setting up my equipment and meeting with the restoration team at the Vatican. The project was even more fascinating than I had anticipated—watching master craftsmen carefully remove centuries of grime and overpainting to reveal the original brilliance of Renaissance frescoes was like witnessing resurrection.
But I found myself thinking often about the incident at JFK, particularly as I observed the social dynamics in my new environment. Romans, I quickly discovered, had very different approaches to managing public spaces and dealing with inconsiderate behavior.
In the crowded buses and metros of Rome, people generally followed unspoken rules about noise levels, personal space, and consideration for others. When someone violated these norms—playing music too loudly, taking up excessive space, or being rude to service workers—other passengers had no hesitation about speaking up directly.
I witnessed several instances where a simple “Scusi, ma il volume è troppo alto” (Excuse me, but the volume is too loud) was enough to modify problematic behavior. The social contract seemed stronger here, perhaps because people were more connected to their community and more willing to enforce shared standards.
This made me reflect on what had been different about the situation at JFK. American culture often emphasizes individual freedom over collective responsibility, which can create situations where one person’s exercise of their “rights” becomes everyone else’s problem. The woman with the dog had been operating under the assumption that her freedom to behave as she pleased trumped everyone else’s right to a peaceful environment.
But individual freedom without social responsibility is just selfishness with better marketing.
Three weeks into my stay in Rome, I received an unexpected email from someone named Margaret Henderson with the subject line “Thank you from Rome Flight 447.”
“Dear fellow passenger,” the email began, “I hope you don’t mind me reaching out, but I got your email address from the photographer’s directory you mentioned during our conversation at the gate. I was the elderly woman sitting with my husband Harold near the window when you performed your magic trick with the disruptive passenger.
“I wanted you to know that your kindness made an enormous difference to our trip. Harold and I are both in our seventies, and we had saved for three years to take this vacation to Italy. We were both dreading the flight because of that woman’s behavior, and honestly, we were considering asking to be moved to a different flight.
“But after you handled the situation so gracefully, we were able to enjoy not just the flight, but our entire vacation. We felt confident that if problems arose, there were good people like you who would step up to help. It changed our whole perspective on traveling at our age.
“I hope your photography project is going well. Harold and I are planning to visit the Vatican museums next week, and we’ll think of you when we see those beautiful frescoes.
“With gratitude, Margaret Henderson”
I read the email three times, feeling a warmth that had nothing to do with the Roman sunshine streaming through my apartment window. It hadn’t occurred to me that my small act of creative problem-solving might have broader implications for how people approached their own challenges.
I wrote back to Margaret, thanking her for taking the time to reach out and encouraging her to enjoy every moment of her Roman adventure. I also found myself inspired to pay more attention to opportunities for small kindnesses during my own daily interactions.
Over the next few weeks, I made an effort to help tourists who looked lost, to assist elderly people with heavy bags on public transportation, and to be patient with service workers who were dealing with difficult customers. None of these actions were dramatic or newsworthy, but they felt like part of a larger project of making shared spaces more comfortable for everyone.
Chapter 8: The Unexpected Sequel
Six weeks into my stay in Rome, I was having dinner at a small trattoria near the Pantheon when I heard a familiar voice at the table behind me.
“I’m telling you, European service is just terrible. These people have no concept of customer service standards. In America, we would never tolerate this kind of treatment.”
I turned around slowly, hardly believing what I was seeing.
It was her. The woman with the white dog from JFK, sitting at a table with what appeared to be a tour group, loudly complaining about the quality of her pasta and the attentiveness of the waitstaff.
She looked exactly the same—perfectly styled hair, expensive clothes, and an expression of perpetual dissatisfaction. The white dog was nowhere to be seen, but her voice was unmistakable.
“The portions are tiny, the wine is overpriced, and don’t even get me started on how long we had to wait for our food,” she was saying to her tablemates, who looked like they were trying to enjoy their evening despite her commentary.
I felt a complicated mix of emotions watching her. Part of me was amused by the cosmic coincidence of encountering her again in a completely different country. Part of me was curious about how she had ended up in Rome after I had sent her on a wild goose chase to Gate 14B. And part of me was concerned for the other people at her table, who were clearly trying to have a pleasant vacation while being subjected to her running critique of everything around them.
The waiter, a patient-looking man in his fifties, approached her table with additional bread.
“This bread is cold,” she announced before he could even set the basket down. “In America, bread is served warm. Don’t you people know anything about proper service?”
The waiter apologized politely in accented English and offered to bring fresh bread from the kitchen.
“Forget it,” she said with a dismissive wave. “The damage is done. I’m definitely leaving a review about this place online.”
I watched this interaction with a mixture of embarrassment and frustration. Here was this beautiful Roman restaurant, family-owned and operated for three generations, being subjected to cultural imperialism by someone who had probably been in Italy for less than a week.
But I also noticed something I hadn’t seen at the airport: the other people at her table were beginning to push back.
“Actually, Susan,” said a woman who appeared to be in her sixties, “I think the bread is lovely. And the service has been perfectly fine.”
“The pasta is delicious,” added a younger man. “This is exactly what I was hoping for from an authentic Italian restaurant.”
“You people are too easily satisfied,” Susan replied. “You don’t understand what real quality looks like.”
“I think we understand quality just fine,” said the older woman, her voice gaining strength. “What we don’t understand is why you feel the need to complain about everything when we’re trying to enjoy our vacation.”
Susan looked genuinely shocked, as if it had never occurred to her that other people might have opinions about her behavior.
“I’m just pointing out that standards here are lower than what we’re used to,” she protested.
“No,” said the younger man firmly. “You’re being rude to the staff and ruining the experience for everyone at this table. If you can’t enjoy being in one of the most beautiful cities in the world, that’s your problem, not ours.”
I watched in fascination as Susan’s usual tactics—loudness, entitlement, and assumption of authority—failed to work with this group. Unlike the passive passengers at JFK, these people were willing to confront her behavior directly.
Susan looked around the table, apparently realizing that she had lost the social dynamics battle. She signaled for the check with exaggerated frustration.
“Fine,” she said. “If you people want to accept substandard treatment, that’s your choice. I’m going back to the hotel.”
She left money on the table and stormed out of the restaurant, leaving behind a group of diners who looked visibly relieved by her departure.
The waiter approached the table cautiously, clearly concerned that the entire group might be unhappy.
“Is everything okay?” he asked in careful English.
“Everything is wonderful,” the older woman assured him. “The woman who just left doesn’t speak for all of us. The food is excellent, and your service has been perfect.”
woman who just left doesn’t speak for all of us. The food is excellent, and your service has been perfect.”
“Grazie mille,” the waiter said with a genuine smile. “Can I bring you anything else? Perhaps some dessert?”
The remaining diners enthusiastically agreed to dessert, and I could see their evening transforming from an endurance test into an actual celebration.
I finished my own meal feeling oddly satisfied. Susan—I now knew her name—had encountered a group of people who were willing to set boundaries with her behavior, and she had been forced to remove herself from the situation. Sometimes, I reflected, the best solution to a problem person is simply refusing to enable their behavior.
Chapter 9: The Real Lesson
The next morning, I was having coffee at a café near my apartment when I noticed Susan again, this time sitting alone at a small table, looking genuinely distressed. Her usual aura of aggressive confidence was gone, replaced by something that looked almost like vulnerability.
Against my better judgment, I found myself approaching her table.
“Excuse me,” I said. “I couldn’t help but notice you look upset. Are you okay?”
She looked up at me with surprise, clearly not recognizing me from either the airport or the restaurant.
“I’m fine,” she said automatically, then seemed to reconsider. “Actually, no. I’m not fine. I’m having the worst vacation of my life.”
I sat down across from her, curious about this unexpected moment of honesty.
“What’s going wrong?” I asked.
“Everything,” she said, her voice small in a way I had never heard before. “The tour group hates me. The hotel staff treats me like I’m some kind of monster. I can’t find anything to eat that doesn’t make me sick. And I still don’t understand how I ended up missing my original flight to Rome.”
My heart skipped a beat at this last comment, but I kept my expression neutral.
“You missed your original flight?”
“Some kind of gate change that nobody told me about,” she said bitterly. “I spent four hours at the wrong gate, missed my flight, and had to book a new one for the next day. It cost me an extra thousand dollars and messed up all my hotel reservations.”
I felt a pang of guilt about the inconvenience I had caused, but I also noticed something important: she was taking no responsibility for failing to verify the information I had given her.
“That sounds frustrating,” I said carefully. “Did you check with the gate agents about the change?”
“I tried to, but they were all useless,” she replied. “Nobody knew anything about anything. It’s like this entire industry is run by incompetent children.”
“Sometimes travel can be really stressful,” I offered. “Maybe the people around you are just trying to do their best in difficult circumstances.”
“Please,” she scoffed, and I saw a flash of her familiar contempt. “These people clearly don’t understand customer service. In my business, we would never treat clients the way I’ve been treated.”
“What business are you in?” I asked.
“Real estate,” she said. “High-end properties. I deal with very sophisticated clients who expect a certain level of service.”
“That must be challenging work,” I said. “Dealing with people who have high expectations.”
“It is,” she agreed. “But that’s what separates professionals from amateurs. You either deliver excellence, or you don’t deserve to be in business.”
I found myself wondering how Susan’s clients actually experienced her version of “excellence.” If her treatment of service workers was any indication, her definition of professional behavior was probably quite different from most people’s.
“Have you considered that maybe the people you’re dealing with are doing their best, even if it doesn’t meet your expectations?” I asked gently.
“Their best isn’t good enough,” she replied firmly. “Standards exist for a reason.”
I realized that this conversation wasn’t going to lead to any meaningful self-reflection on Susan’s part. She was fundamentally convinced that other people were the problem, and no amount of gentle suggestion was going to change that perspective.
“Well, I hope the rest of your trip goes better,” I said, standing up to leave.
“Thanks,” she said, though she was already looking at her phone, probably composing another complaint email.
As I walked away, I reflected on what I had learned about Susan during our brief conversation. She wasn’t evil or malicious—she was just completely lacking in empathy and self-awareness. She genuinely believed that her standards were objective measures of quality, rather than personal preferences shaped by privilege and entitlement.
But understanding her psychology didn’t make her behavior any less harmful to the people around her. The waiter at the restaurant still had to endure her rudeness. The tour group still had to manage her constant complaints. The airline staff still had to deal with her unreasonable demands.
Sometimes, I concluded, the most compassionate thing you can do for everyone involved is to remove a disruptive person from a situation where they’re causing harm—even if they don’t understand or appreciate why that’s necessary.
Epilogue: The Art of Necessary Deception
I completed my photography project at the Vatican three months later, having documented the restoration of frescoes that had been hidden under centuries of grime and overpainting. The work was meticulous and revelatory—each careful stroke of the restorer’s brush revealed colors and details that no one had seen for hundreds of years.
There was something metaphorically appropriate about this process. Sometimes, getting to the truth requires carefully removing layers of accumulated nonsense, whether that’s physical dirt on a Renaissance masterpiece or social conventions that enable bad behavior in public spaces.
On my final day in Rome, I had dinner at the same trattoria where I had encountered Susan weeks earlier. The same patient waiter was working, and I asked him if he remembered the difficult American customer who had complained about everything.
“Ah, sì,” he said with a weary smile. “We get one or two like that every tourist season. They come to Italy expecting it to be like America, then get angry when it’s different.”
“How do you handle customers like that?” I asked.
He shrugged philosophically. “You serve them with professionalism, you don’t take it personally, and you hope they leave quickly so the other customers can enjoy their evening.”
“Does it bother you when people are rude?”
“Of course,” he said. “But you know what I learned after twenty years in this business? The people who complain the most are usually the ones who are most unhappy with themselves. They take their problems everywhere they go.”
This observation stayed with me during my flight back to New York. Susan’s behavior at JFK, on the plane she eventually caught, and throughout her time in Rome had all been consistent—she was someone who experienced the world as a series of disappointments and frustrations, and she dealt with those feelings by trying to control everyone around her.
My intervention at Gate 22 hadn’t changed her fundamental character, but it had protected dozens of other travelers from having to endure the consequences of her unhappiness. Sometimes, that’s the best outcome you can hope for.
When I landed at JFK—the same airport where this story had begun—I found myself back at Gate 22, waiting for a connecting flight to Los Angeles. The gate area was peaceful, filled with travelers who were managing their stress and fatigue with consideration for others.
An elderly gentleman was helping a young mother lift her heavy bag into an overhead compartment. A group of teenagers was playing cards quietly, conscious of not disturbing other passengers. A business traveler was having a phone conversation, but he had stepped away from the seating area and was speaking in low tones.
It was exactly what a shared public space should be—a place where strangers could coexist comfortably, each respecting the others’ need for peace and basic courtesy.
As I sat there, I thought about the small acts of creative problem-solving that make civilized society possible. Most of the time, these acts are invisible—a quiet word that prevents a confrontation, a helpful gesture that smooths over a difficult moment, a strategic intervention that removes a source of conflict before it can escalate.
My deception at Gate 22 had been one small example of this kind of intervention. I had used information warfare—admittedly on a very minor scale—to restore peace to a shared space. The means had been questionable, but the results had been unambiguously positive.
Six months later, I received an email from Margaret Henderson with photos from her trip to Italy. She and Harold had visited the Vatican museums, seen the restored frescoes I had photographed, and had what she described as “the adventure of a lifetime.”
“We’re planning another trip next year,” she wrote. “To Paris this time. Harold says we should look for you at the gate in case we need any more of your special assistance!”
I laughed out loud reading this, imagining this sweet elderly couple scanning airport gates for signs of trouble they might need help addressing.
But her email also made me think about the ripple effects of small actions. Because Margaret and Harold had enjoyed their first international trip, they were planning another one. Because they felt confident that good people would help them if problems arose, they were willing to take new risks and have new adventures.
That confidence—the belief that strangers will look out for each other when necessary—is one of the foundations of a functioning society. And sometimes, maintaining that foundation requires being willing to take creative action when normal social mechanisms fail.
I never saw Susan again, though I occasionally wondered what had happened to her after Rome. Had she eventually recognized that her behavior was the common factor in all her negative travel experiences? Had she learned to treat service workers with basic respect? Had she figured out how to travel without making life miserable for everyone around her?
Probably not. People like Susan rarely change unless forced to by consequences they can’t avoid or blame on others. But that’s okay. The goal was never to reform her character—it was simply to protect other people from the effects of her behavior.
Sometimes, the most effective form of social justice is just removing harmful people from situations where they can cause harm. Sometimes, a small lie serves a greater truth. And sometimes, the most compassionate thing you can do is give someone a reason to walk away before things get worse for everyone involved.
The next time I encountered egregiously bad behavior in a public space, I was ready with new strategies, new approaches, and a better understanding of how creative problem-solving can serve the greater good.
Because in the end, we’re all sharing this crowded, complicated world together. And if we want it to be a place where people can coexist peacefully, sometimes we have to be willing to take action when someone threatens that peace.
Even if it means sending them on a wild goose chase to Gate 14B.
THE END
Author’s Note: This story explores themes of public behavior, social responsibility, and the ethics of intervention when someone’s actions harm others. It asks questions about when deception might be justified in service of the greater good, and examines how small acts of creative problem-solving can make shared spaces more livable for everyone. Most importantly, it’s about the courage to take action when witnessing behavior that harms others, and the recognition that sometimes the most effective intervention is the most unexpected one.
