{"id":14252,"date":"2024-09-04T19:49:57","date_gmt":"2024-09-04T19:49:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/diigital.press\/?p=11728"},"modified":"2024-09-04T19:49:57","modified_gmt":"2024-09-04T19:49:57","slug":"child-on-a-plane-passed-me-a-note-and-10-it-changed-my-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/otrxio.com\/?p=14252","title":{"rendered":"Child on a Plane Passed Me a Note and $10 \u2014 It Changed My Life"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>What started as a routine flight home turned into a life-changing encounter. I boarded the plane, expecting a quiet trip, but found myself sitting next to a nervous young boy, alone and clutching a safety card. As the plane took off, he handed me a crumpled note with a ten-dollar bill. The note read: \u201cMy son, who has autism, is sitting next to you. Please be kind and patient.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Touched by the mother\u2019s trust, I texted her, assuring her that her son was fine. She replied, \u201cThank you so much, Derek. He\u2019s had a rough few days, but I know he\u2019ll be okay with you there.\u201d I engaged the boy, Elliot, in conversation, bought him a snack, and even took a selfie with him. Gradually, he opened up, sharing his excitement about seeing his mom.<\/p>\n<p>Upon landing, I walked with Elliot to meet his mother, Diane, who was visibly relieved to see him. She thanked me emotionally, and we struck up a conversation. Before long, I found myself asking her out for coffee.<\/p>\n<p>Two years later, Diane and I are married, and Elliot is my stepson. Diane loves to tell how \u201ca crumpled note and a ten-dollar bill led to the best thing that ever happened to us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n<div style=\"font-size: 0px; height: 0px; line-height: 0px; margin: 0; padding: 0; clear: both;\"><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What started as a routine flight home turned into a life-changing encounter. I boarded the plane, expecting a quiet trip, but found myself sitting next to a nervous young boy, alone and clutching a safety card. As the plane took off, he handed me a crumpled note with a ten-dollar bill. The note read: \u201cMy [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11729,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14252","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/otrxio.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/462499134_420247277761968_7408020445145964232_n.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/otrxio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14252","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/otrxio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/otrxio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/otrxio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/otrxio.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14252"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/otrxio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14252\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/otrxio.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/otrxio.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14252"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/otrxio.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14252"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/otrxio.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14252"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}