Our homilist this weekend at The National Shrine of Our Lady of the Snows told a version of this story to begin his homily this past weekend:
After being snowbound for two weeks last winter, a Seattle man departed for his vacation in Miami Beach, where he was to meet his wife in two days at the conclusion of her business trip to Minneapolis. They were looking forward to pleasant weather and a nice time together.
Unfortunately, there was some sort of mix-up at the boarding gate, and the man was told he would have to wait for a later flight. He tried to appeal to a supervisor but was told the airline was not responsible for the problem and it would do no good to complain.
Upon arrival at the hotel the next day, he discovered that Miami Beach was having a heat wave, and its weather was almost as uncomfortably hot as Seattle’s was cold. The desk clerk gave him a message that his wife would arrive as planned. He could hardly wait to get to the pool area to cool off, and quickly sent his wife an e-mail, but due to his haste, he made an error in the e-mail address. His message therefore arrived at the home of an elderly preacher’s wife whose even older husband had died only the day before!
When the grieving widow opened her e-mail, she took one look at the monitor, let out an anguished scream, and fell to the floor dead. Her family rushed to her room where they saw this message on the screen:
Dearest wife,
Departed yesterday as you know. Just now got checked in. Some confusion at the gate. Appeal was denied. Received confirmation of your arrival tomorrow.
Your loving husband.
PS – Things are not as we thought. You’re going to be surprised at how hot it is down here.