Travel Unravel

A twin propeller plane. Two lines of single seats along the inside separated by a foot of floor space. Twenty people squashed together like sardines. The bone jarring rattles and shakes of a flying object attempting to escape the clutches of gravity. My nose buried in an in-plane magazine. Prayers mumbled through chattering teeth. The sweat dripping off my forehead slowly coursing its way across my glasses. My eyes fighting to focus against the dizzying reek of aviation fuel. Eyeing the little crack on the window pane, willing it to stay together till the plane landed. Stomach turning drops and climbs as the plane flew through turbulence. My toes curled tightly against the bottom of my shoes, hoping that this one random physical act would miraculously keep this flying heap of nuts and bolts in the air. But wait a minute. I’m getting ahead of myself. What I really wanted to say was, I love to travel!

You would think that a typically boring one hour flight from Tampa to Miami would be the most improbable setting for the adventure of my life. But guess what, it was! This journey somehow transformed into a fight for survival (All through the flight I FOUGHT this intense urge to jump off the plane. So yes! It was a fight for survival….in a way.) Why jump, you ask? Well, it seemed like a logical thing to do at that time, considering the alternative would mean plunging to death in this monstrosity of engineering! I might stand a better chance of living by taking a leap of faith out of the plane (it would also serve the dual purpose of fulfilling my dream of going sky diving one day!)

The plane was held together with spare parts from World War 2 and lots of crossed-fingers (and some of those crossed fingers were the same arthritis plagued ones that had put this glorified tin can together…so I didn’t place too much faith in that!) My apprehension was certainly not helped by the captain of the plane, a tyro, Latino casa-nova, with ruffled hair, dark aviator sunglasses, swaggering around with the top two buttons of his uniform undone. He would look more appropriate standing on the side of the road whistling at passing women. I also remember this big lug of a guy, who had somehow managed to squeeze his 6 foot 5 inch frame into the miniscule seat behind me. His knees brushed up right against his chin! He was traveling with an old lady, obviously his mother. Just as the plane took off he leaned over across the aisle (not too difficult, he was already occupying half of it!) and said to his mother, “Next time, I’ll pay the extra hundred dollars!”

There maybe some people out there who at this point might ask me, very wisely, I might add, “Why did you book yourself in this death-trap?”

Oh! wise one, let me put it this way. I didn’t!

All this, because of one pure, unadulterated moment of insanity on the part of a company secretary who decided that if getting me on time to my software training meant laying MY life on the line, then so be it, she was willing to do so!! I could have been booked on a Boeing 737 leaving a few hours later but the secretary believed that creature comforts like fresh air, leg space, and my right to live where an unnecessary financial burden on the company and cutting back on these would save a few dollars (which they could then use to put up a small memorial in my honor, subsequent to my unfortunate demise in a plane crash!)

The plane landed safely at the airport (Not before scaring all of us half to death by bouncing on the runway, twice, during touchdown.) The big guy sitting behind me whimpered, which I found highly amusing. Hey! Don’t judge me! I’m not a sadist. It was just this mental picture of a big, huge guy, ensconced in this teeny-tiny chair cracked me up! Heck, I was more worried that if he had peed his pants we might all drown inside this plane!

I literally jumped the last three steps off the staircase from the plane.

As I ran into the terminal, i was stopped by an attendant at the gate and he handed me something that looked like a coupon. A discount coupon for my next ride on this flying coffin! I resisted the urge to shove it back down his throat but just as I moved past him I let one of my carry-on bags bump him hard, right in the crotch! Oops! Sorry! (Yeah, right!) I walked on and kept a lookout for a trash can. I sure as hell was not going to use the coupon. I was not ready to die yet.

Just then, from out of the blue, a brainwave. The smile returned to my face. A gleam in my eye. A spring in my step, my heart a flutter. I put the coupon back in my pocket, and walked out the front entrance. Barely able to contain my excitement I touched my pocket again to see if the discount coupon was still there. Just as I flagged down a taxi, this one last brilliant thought raced through my head…“I wonder if secretaries take vacations!”