Swallowed-down rage in a senior citizen trapped in an airplane on a runway to nowhere smells like cantaloupe, wicked and musky.
The pilot was just admitting even he didn't know why we were still on the ground when she turned to me. 'This,' she intoned, knobby fingers flying with the injustice of it all, 'is intolerable. They act as though we are not human.'
I agreed. We were crammed into a small jet, every seat full, most people hunched in their seats to avoid the low headroom, afraid to fully extend their legs because they might launch the poor fellow sitting in the row in front of them into the seat in front of him (and so on - a domino effect of claiming your rightful space) breathing stale air, and since this was to have been a 'quick' flight, the flight attendant wasn't even bringing the drinks cart around. The idea that we were chickens crammed in a box ready to be taken to market began to take root in my head.
Rose, in the seat next to me, had been on plane after plane today (she was flying back from Italy) and was resolute and pale with the grimness of it all. She was quiet except for a few squawks, exchanging gripes with her friends, her head darting back and forth from where I sat, curving my spine to see out of the window.
Honestly. What good is a window that is placed at chest height? And I'd like to suggest to the airplane industry that they remember that North America is getting fatter and taller, and stop with making the legroom and headroom smaller and smaller, and narrowing the seats. Because if airplane travel is not convienent (which, with the full body scans, the charging for any checked baggage, the ridiculous ticket prices, and the general don't-mess-with-me mentality that 99% of the airport staff have, it's NOT) and it's not fast (over an HOUR and a quarter spent baking on the tarmac at JFK. No official word why.) and it's not comfortable, then why in hell aren't we all taking the train?
I'm not a chicken in a cage, after all.
3 comments:
"...resolute an dpale with the grimness of it all".
Now that is GOOD writing! This captures exactly how I feel each time i must travel by plane... which is way too often.
Nice post!
The luggage thing is what kills me: They force people to pay to check even a single bag, so then more and more people try to haul more and more stuff as carry-on, well beyond the limits of what is allowed, which then makes the interior of the plane even more crowded.
And don't even get me started on the pat-downs and whatnot.
I would, I really would, but that train from Scotland to Nova Scotia is just no fun at all!
Post a Comment