When You Get On A Plane

I’m getting on a plane Saturday and heading to Florida for a week
of relaxation with a good friend. Most people would be happy.
Excited even. I just keep thinking: “I’M GETTING ON A PLANE.”

Not that I’m afraid of flying. That’s not quite accurate. If I could actually fly, like Superman, I think I might like it a lot.

But it is completely accurate to say I don’t like planes, and here’s why:

When you get on a plane, they lock you inside and you cannot get off until they say so. You CANNOT. You are at their mercy in plane prison.

When you get on a plane, you notice right away the air inside is wrong. It’s artificial, germ-infested air and I’m pretty sure it’s limited. They try to make you think there’s air aplenty by placing a tiny little blower above your head, but it’s a mere device - a placebo to make you think you might actually have enough air to breathe the entire flight.

When you get on a plane, it’s hot and stuffy, due to wrong air.

When you get on a plane, you sit shoulder to shoulder in tiny little seats next to complete strangers. Complete air-sucking strangers. It’s not bad enough that the seats are too narrow for a wide bottom and there’s not enough leg room for even the shortest legs. No, planes take discomfort to an excrutiating level by strapping you into a seat like that right next to a person YOU DON’T KNOW. (Notice to other flyers: I’m claustrophic and I still request a window seat so I can hug the wall and not have to touch YOU.)

When you get on a plane, you can't drive through McDonalds or stop to read that curious little historic marker by the Shoney's parking lot. Planes actually lift off from the road they are driving on and take you up in the air. Way up. Unnaturally up. Into a totally ashphalt-free and Starbucks-free zone.

I try not to think about it. I hug the wall in my window seat, close the little plastic shade and pretend I’m on a bus.