From hidden brain media, I'm Shankar Vedantam.
This is my unsung hero stories, where one person reached out to help another in a time of need.
My story is about a group of unsung heroes.
He just pulled up a chair and we talked, I'd say, for about 90 minutes or so.
I don't know if she really understands or appreciates the full impact that that she's had in my life and still continues to have.
Today's story comes from Wendy McDowell.
When Wendy was very young, her parents separated.
A few years later, when she was eight years old, they arranged for her to travel from upstate New York, where she was living with her mom, to North Dakota to visit her dad.
No one in Wendy's family was able to fly her back and forth, so it was decided that she would be chaperoned by a family friend.
A 19 year old she had never met were calling her Kim.
Their flight out to North Dakota was uneventful.
On their way back to the east coast, Kim and Wendy landed in Chicago for a layover.
They discovered that their connecting flight was canceled, and thats when Kim made a choice that Wendy still struggles to understand.
She booked herself on another flight, headed home, and left Wendy to fend for herself.
She left me in the Chicago O'Hare airport as an eight year old with no flight, no plan, no adult in charge of me.
Just literally walked away.
I really have no idea how long I cried by myself in the airport.
I remember just feeling so desperate, just, you know, that feeling that we've all had, it's that feeling of being a kid and looking around.
Every single face is a stranger's face and just how terrifying that is.
So it was like that, but there was no one coming for me.