Southwest passenger Sally Rollins admitted on Sunday that she knew deep down that her bag would never fit in the overhead compartment on her cross-country flight to San Francisco. Rollins recalls kneeling on the floor next to her closet, forcing the zipper on her nearly regulation-sized luggage, secretly realizing that she would not have the strength to squeeze that overstuffed monster of a bag in the communal space.
Boarding the plane for her 8:05 AM flight out of Washington Dulles, fellow passengers reported Rollins mumbling under her breath, “Please, please, please let it be a full flight. Just take my bag. Check my bag, please just check it for me.” However, her prayers were not answered and she rolled her wheelie right onto the aircraft unhindered by flight attendants. Nervously finding her seat at row 23, where she just knew she would be squished between a heavy couple that wanted both the window and the aisle seat, she spotted an unoccupied opening in the overhead compartment, lifted the oversized bag and began to shove.
Despite having absolutely zero faith that this luggage would ever get onto this narrow shelf, she insisted to the flight attendant that she had travelled with this bag hundreds of times and never once had to check it. “No, I promise! This will work,” she lied, as she hoisted and pushed without a budge just as she had always secretly suspected. Due to the number of people waiting in the aisle behind Rollins, the flight attendant was forced to “insist” on taking the bag to be checked free of charge.
