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Aunt Kimmie dropped us off at DIA about 90 minutes before our plane was scheduled to take off. I figured we'd have plenty of time to get checked in, go through security, get down to our gate, and maybe have some extra time to run into one of the giftshops and stop for one last potty break. WRONG! The lines for check-in were horrendous (even though we used the automated machine to get our boarding passes), and there were a gazillion people trying to get through security, although it did move faster than I thought it would based on the lines. When we approached the "podium" in Security, I gave my license and our boarding tickets to the very nice, but very serious-looking lady standing behind it. She looked at me and back at my license three times (honestly, I've hardly changed AT ALL since high school!) and smiled as she handed everything back to me--except for Tyler's boarding pass. She took off her school teacher-ish spectacles, looked down at him with a small smile, and said, "How are you today, young man?" He said, "Good," while looking around and shuffling his feet, showing his rarely existent shy side. She asked him to look at her, so he did, and the following exchange occurred:

What is your name, son? "Tyler Craig Lunning"
How old are you? "Five."
Where are you going today? "Home." At this point, she looks over at me and kind of smiles.
And where do you live? "St. Louis."
He must have passed the test. And I was obviously ruled out as a possible kidnapper based on their little conversation, because she handed Tyler his boarding pass, thanked him, and told us to enjoy our flight. It felt kind of strange to me at first, but I'm actually glad she did it. With everything happening in the world today, you never know what people might try to get away with. Our next obstacle was getting through security, which went pretty smoothly. Tyler had his shoes off before we even made it up to the conveyor belt (he's a pro at this!) and he was huge help as I emptied out backpacks, computer bags, and camera cases. We had our own little assembly line going; as I put an item into a bin, he pushed it through the "little curtain," as he called it. After he walked through "the tunnel," the gentleman saluted him and gave him a sticker. Then, we got all of our stuff packed up and headed for the subway. Got down to our gate to find it empty--we were officially the last people to board a FULL flight and left the gate with two minutes to spare. Whew!

When we deboarded at Lambert, the pilot stopped us at the exit and asked Tyler (who was the only child on the flight) if he would like a picture of the plane we were on. He of course said "Yes," and the pilot gave him a baseball card-size photo of our United aircraft. Then (and I was not expecting this), he looked at Tyler and said, "How would you like to drive my airplane?" Tyler's eyes got big as he looked at me as if to ask if it would be okay. I told him to go ahead and he giggled as he climbed into the pilot's chair in the cockpit. He was smiling ear-to-ear the whole time. The pilot asked if I "happened" to have a camera handy. I chuckled because anyone who's known me for 5 minutes knows that I never go anywhere without it. :) The flight attendant offered to hold our carry on bags while I dug it out and started snapping. The co-pilot let Tyler push a few of the buttons and showed him some of the other cool features. This was definitely the highlight of the trip home for him and it melted my heart to see him so excited.