[This post was written on November 9, 2010 when we flew to Hawaii.]
It’s less than two months since we flew home from Japan and I again find myself composing a blog post at 35,000 feet on the second leg of a journey that is taking us from Philly to Honolulu via Phoenix. (I sort of slunk around the Phoenix airport during our layover, trying not to look like an illegal alien because I didn’t bring my passport.)
We woke up 4:30 AM this morning to get to the airport. (PHL is a happening place at 5:45 AM–if you like standing in lines). Adding up our two flights, we are logging about 11 and a half hours of flying time today. Only, unlike on our flights to and from Japan, this time we are soooo not flying business class.
Although we intellectually know that planes fly full these days, we continue to choose an aisle and a window seat in the insane hope that no one will sit between us. On this morning’s flight, the guy in the middle needed a seat belt extender. Not an auspicious start. At the moment, there’s a sailor stationed at Pearl Harbor snoozing between us. My husband, Steve, is in the aisle seat watching the “Sorcerer’s Apprentice”.
The sailor has arguably the worst seat on the plane. Steve has the next worst seat being on the aisle, while I at least have a window to lean against. We used a travel agent to book these flights. Somehow, she managed to use her “expertise” to get us seats with our backs against a bulkhead, so the seats don’t recline and of course, we’re right in front of the bathroom, so Steve will have an up close and personal experience with the people lined up in the aisle waiting to relieve themselves. Moreover (lawyer word alert), the aisle is very narrow, so when the person trying to return to his or her seat has to get by the people waiting in the aisle, they either have to become indecently physically close to a stranger (with a full bladder no less) or lean over Steve, where theoretically, they can invade his space without actually touching him—unless there is turbulence….
We can’t blame the travel agent for the baby two rows in front of us who does not cry constantly, but who lets out blood curdling shrieks from time to time.
On our flight this morning, for the first time, we were on a plane when a flight attendant got on the PA and asked if there was a physician on board. Steve looked around hoping some other doctor would leap to his or her feet, announce that they were triple boarded in emergency medicine, cardiology and neurosurgery, pull out their portable defibrillator and leave him to return to the grant application he was writing. However, either we were actually on a flight that had no other MD passengers (unlikely) or Steve was the only one on board who actually felt bound by his Hippocratic oath. As Steve was in the back tending to a young woman who was lying on the floor, it occurred to me that it might be his call as to whether we would make our Phoenix connection or be landing emergently in Indianapolis. Fortunately, Steve’s aero-patient eventually became able to sit up without feeling like she was going to pass out.
By the way, did I ever tell you Steve’s my hero ? (Cue swelling music —“The Wind Beneath My Wings”).
(I don’t want to violate anybody’s copyright, so you can look the song up on www.YouTube.com if you can’t already hum it).
So, the sailor is still completely out — head back, mouth open (no drooling yet), Steve is still engrossed in a movie that no one would go to with him at home — and, maybe I (in the window seat) shouldn’t have had that diet coke.
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