My Teavana and the T.S.A.

Today I'm flying home to North Carolina. My flight from Des Moines, Iowa left at a headache-inducing 6:00. I did the pre-check-in online. I did not check baggage. I'd flown on Friday without any difficulty. I have a backpack, a knitting bag, and my small purse that I put inside the knitting bag.

As I approached the TSA check-point, I removed my laptop and my ziploc baggie of liquids and toothpaste, placing everything in the trays. I stepped through the metal detector without incident, and I waited for my bags.

My backpack was cleared and came through, as was my laptop. But they kept my knitting bag and my purse. And I waited. And I waited. They would not tell me anything, which is fine. I had 30 minutes until my plane flew away.

While in Des Moines, I drove across town to their Teavana store. For you non-tea-lovers out there, Teavana is some dreamy, lovely, expensive tea. I went to smell the store, and hopefully to find a pretty decorate tea canister. I've never lived near a Teavana store, and won't have a chance to visit one again, so it was a special experience. This was their last pretty little tea canister:

Teavana has sold itself to Starbucks, so this was my only chance to shop in their store, and they had items discounted up to 75% off! I found some interesting tea -- Oprah Chai Herbal Tea. They had a 16 oz. bag, 75% off. I was so excited. This is very, very pricey tea, and normally I could never afford their tea. This bag is a $90 item. (Can you imagine??) Even at 75% off, it was a big splurge for me, but I knew the tea was high quality and would last for months. I wanted a chai that would be absolutely caffeine-free, so I could enjoy a cup in the evenings. I was thrilled to find it.

This is not my bag of tea. As you'll read, I never got a chance to photograph it, until it was no longer mine. But this photo shows the kind of packaging Teavana uses: a stiff plastic bag with a tear-off top and a ziploc closure. The girl told me their teas are all organic without preservatives of any kind, so they are sealed and packaged well.

So I went through the T.S.A., and apparently they did not like my tea. They removed it from my other bags (it was in the knitting bag), and they scanned it, and they called over other agents, and they spent lots of time examining some charts behind their desk. I asked, "What's wrong with the tea?" And the agent would only say, "It set off an alarm." I'm checking my watch as the minutes tick away.

Meanwhile, because my tea was suspicious, I guess I became suspicion-worthy also, because then they had to pat me down, even though I'd already passed through the metal-detector. I had to remove my shoes, even though I'd pre-checked-in. I had to wait a long time (while nervously checking my departure time) for a female agent to come. As she described the procedure, I grimaced, and I told her frankly, "I'm never flying again." I don't like strangers telling me they're about to touch my groin. There is nothing in this procedure that actually protects Americans. It does alarm and dishearten us though. I told her I would prefer to have the pat-down in public. I figure other Americans around me need to see what happens. If something is de-humanizing in our society, it needs to be happening in the open so we can all know. Before she began, I asked if I should move my backpack (which had passed muster) down with me. She said I could not touch it, because I had not yet been cleared. Really? I had JUST CARRIED THAT SAME BACKPACK 5 minutes before, and set it down. And now, somehow, magically, I was so tainted that I was not allowed to touch it?

I also told her, as she reached around my thighs, that I knew she didn't like it any more than I did, and that she was only doing her job. And even though it's a nasty, degrading job, I felt she did her best and was not particularly inconsiderate of me. So I pulled myself together, reassembled my possessions -- except the one-pound bag of tea -- and waited.

The agent had told me I had three options with that tea: 1) take it back outside to my car, 2) check it with Delta as checked baggage, 3) have him throw it away. Of course, those are all bad options. I did not want to lose my lovely tea! You may call me shallow or silly if you like, but that bag of tea was my personal property, I'd paid $23 for it, it was a splurge that I would never be able to do again, and frankly, it's my right to have it on an airplane if it is not dangerous to anyone. So I rejected option #3. Since I'd been dropped off at the airport by a sleepy niece at 4:45 a.m., I could not take it to a car outside. I didn't even know how that would work. So, no option #1. With my plane flying away in less than a half-hour, I wondered if I would miss my flight.

So I looked hopefully at him and asked, "Oh! I can check that?" (I haven't flown since 2009, and I wish TSA agents would realize that some passengers culprits might need helpful advice and assistance. But of course -- it's NOT the TSA's job to assist you. It's their job to be suspicious and remove anything they want to.

He said, "You'll have to check with your airlines. I don't know."

"Can I put the tea back in the Teavana shopping bag? I don't have any other bag to check it in. Would they let me check it like that?"

"You'll have to ask your airlines."

I wondered if anybody had  a stapler so I could secure the top of the bag while it was jumbled around with everyone's suitcases and baby strollers. I mean -- can you even check a little gift bag like that, on a flight? I had no idea. I needed help.

So I told him I'd like to try to check it. Silly me -- I assumed they would have a mechanism to facilitate that, like a Delta agent nearby to help me. The man, still carrying my tea bag, guided me across the TSA area, toward the exit. I really did not understand. Why was he making me leave?

After the heart-breaking emotion of the past week at my niece's funeral, it was just too much. "Wait!" I said, turning emotional and teary. "All I want is to keep my tea!"

He stopped and turned to me. "Fine," he said, and he thrust the bag to me. For a split second, I thought perhaps he'd changed his mind (which is ludicrous, I know). But then he lifted his arm and pointed to the exit of the airport, as if to show me out. Then I became terrified that, because I'd raised my voice in distress,\ and insisted on keeping my tea, that he felt I was some sort of a threat, and was telling me to LEAVE. That I wouldn't be allowed to fly home. Then my emotions truly overcame me.

I dropped everything I had on the floor -- backpack, knitting bag, purse, driver's license, boarding passes -- and I began to cry. "I don't care! Throw it away!" I cried. I was trying to show him that I was not a threat by dropping everything in my hands. I was terrified they would not let me fly at all.

In my fear, I scooped up all my belongings, leaving him holding my tea, and walked the other way - through the TSA toward my gate. No one stopped me. I hollered back at them all, "You're not keeping anyone safe!" And I believe that -- they're not.

One family member said of the TSA this past week, that their actions in the airport are not designed to make Americans safe; they're designed to make Americans FEEL safe. All the machines and metal-detection and searches and agents standing around gruffly -- all to make us feel they're doing a good job. But it's a farce, and I don't think it makes Americans feel better. I feel much, much worse.

I feel violated. I feel dehumanized. Since when is it the government's job to steal my personal property without any proof at all (or really any attempt at proving) that the property is any danger to anyone? The tea was just dried leaves -- was it the packaging that was scary? I would have happily opened the packaging, dumped the tea into a ziploc bag, and showed them that it contained only dry herb leaves and dry spices. But that as not an option - they wouldn't let me touch the bag. I would have happily checked the item, if I'd had help to do it and could be sure I wouldn't miss my flight in an attempt to keep my property -- but that wasn't an option either. I would have loved to have some support and help from the TSA, but clearly, that wasn't an option either.

I cried all the way to my gate, and I cried on the plane at 6:00 a.m.

I wonder what important, precious items other Americans have had stolen from them -- more precious than a $23 bag of herbal tea -- without any proof that it was harmful. I think the TSA should have to prove that an unopened item from a reputable company, is threatening. That tea bag was shipped all over the country without question. I followed their guidelines. I had no liquids, no pastes, no gels, that they could not inspect. If someone had told me that that bag would be taken, I'd have addressed it ahead of time, dumping the contents into a ziploc, and leaving the Teavana packaging in a trash can. But nobody told me until I was in a TSA line, forced to decide between my personal property and returning home to my husband.

That kind of forced decision, that kind of coercion, is wrong. Our government cannot simultaneously insist that they value and protect us, while treating us that way. And I still say, as I told that woman -- I will never fly again.