Are we really free to move about the country?
Airplane boarding pass in hand, I struggle down the aisle with my carry-on to find out that my seat is about seven and one half inches from the First Class curtain. In fact, the assigned, almost kiddie-sized chair is right in front of a gaping hole in the curtain. Yes, I have the pleasure of viewing everything I am not going to receive in economy.
The welcoming drinks, the hot hand towels, and the instant TV service start parading up and down the hallowed aisles almost immediately. Did I mention I have no TV because it is a special middle seat and I share a TV on one side of the chair, and the table on the other. I place my hand on the arm rest in front of me in defiance. I want to smack the guy seven inches away from me so we can share his TV.
While they are taking orders for either salmon or pesto ravioli in the front of the plane I have also been informed my chair will not go down so I will be sitting in the upright position for the whole flight.
It’s hot, menopausal hot, and of course my air “thingie” above me does not work and I am literally dying. The stewardess hands me 1/2 cup of warm diet coke in a plastic glass full of ice. I down the coke quickly and immediately go into child labour mode sucking on the ice. I gaze at the man in front of me with a crystal glass full of champagne and Blue Diamond pretzels. I could have really used some of that champagne for the pain in my knee that has escalated.
They suddenly pull the first class curtain over, and I wonder why, as I gaze through the 16 by 28 inch hole in front of me. I am getting warmer, I have my Twilight hoodie on, and there is absolutely not one inch to spare to take said jacket off. I want to scream like Elaine in one of my favourite Seinfeld episodes:
“Mrs Seinfeld, I am begging you. Please put on the air !”
The lady on the left of me proceeds to take off her shoes.
What?
Obviously this woman has never rode the Greyhound bus, where the first “rule du jour” is:
Do not take off your shoes as they are grounds for disembarkment!
The woman on the the other side of me reeks of garlic she must ingested before she got on the plane. It smells fresh, and I realize it must have been a small side Caesar salad, so she would not starve on the plane that offers 9 dollar sandwiches and 3 dollar cookies. I gaze through the curtain hole once more, and the same man is now watching Glee. The nerve of him!
I feel like I am in a herd of cattle now, very claustrophobic and I need pain medicine now! My coke is gone, my ice is all chewed up, so I suck the Advil down dry. Thirty minutes later the knee has stopped throbbing, but now my back is frozen in pain. In front of me they are reclining, stretching, and yawning.
Rain starts to gather on the windows and turbulence starts. Note to self to go open the side door in the front. If we have any luck at all and the plane tilts, we will lose those first-class suckers in about two seconds flat, and I can sit in the guy’s seat ahead of me. No such thing happens, and we touch down with a thud. As I stare at the luggage conveyor belt and watch a small dog come out in a cage I know what he feels like. We both missed sitting in the Promised Land.