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Trapped in a Tin Can
I am not an experienced traveller. The one and only time I have been on an airplane, I was five years old. It was a kindergarten fieldtrip. I have no recollection of the flight other than watching my mother turn green and being able to eat her apple turnover.
I was a little nervous about flying to see my husband. I didn’t want to make an ass of myself.
Turns out, I should have been born with wings. I LOVE flying. Ninety-nine percent of the experience thrilled me.
Except for my seat mates.
On the flight towards my darling Boo, I was seated next to a man. He smelled pleasant enough. He looked clean. But he had gas. Turns out he just had mexican food for lunch and it wasn’t sitting well with him. I knew I was in for a bumpy ride when he turned to me, apologized and asked if I had any Bean-o.
Flatulence at it’s finest. (I only wish I was making this up.)
Other than the odd odour emanating from the man next to me, the flight was intoxicating. I loved it. I loved being able to look down at the world and marvel at how truly small we are on this planet. It really gives a girl perspective when she sees just how insignificant we are on this planet.
I was excited for my return flight home. I already knew the Gas Man from the day before would not be on my plane (yes, my nose hairs required that I ask), so I was pumped for flight. I figured my chances for getting a normal seat mate next to me were pretty fair after the previous experience the day before.
(Go ahead. Mock me now. I know I asked for it.)
Turns out, I really am the most naive person on the face of this planet. I watched in horror as this middle-aged, hoity-toity woman who treated everyone around her like dirt eyeballed the seat beside me. I prayed fervently that she was just looking at my wallet resting on the empty seat.
I knew I was doomed when she stopped at my seat and demanded that I get up and help her load her carry-on luggage into the overhead compartment. Being the complacent and polite fool I am, I over-looked her barking orders at me like a servant and did my best to help this short, over-perfumed, fur-wearing J-Lo wannabe woman load her carry on.
She took the seat next to me with out proffering a simple thank you and turned to me and upon noticing my neck tattoo said “Back in my day, the only girls who had tattoos where the crack addicts and whores.”
Uh, thanks, I think. Does this mean I don’t resemble a crack addict or a whore? I must not be trying hard enough.
I simply smiled at her while trying not to stare in amazement at the the amount of jewellery she had ladled on. I didn’t want to seem like a redneck hick who had never flown before.
I leaned back in my seat, closed my eyes and tried to relive the night of wild, passionate monkey sex with my husband from the night before. (Apparently loud monkey sex, as he was later informed by the guys at work who stay in adjoining hotel rooms. Ooops. Glad I didn’t have to make eye contact with any of them.)
I could feel her eyes burning holes into me as I tried to block her out and remember the evening past.
Thankfully, it was a short flight and she kept her mouth shut for most of it. When we landed I helped the J-Lo imposter retrieve her luggage and I left the airplane with out a thought to the bitchy lady who thought the world owed her something; eager to get home to show the kids and my friends the fancy new bling my darling husband surprised ME with when I arrived.
As I was admiring the blinding glare off the huge ass rock my hand now sported, I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned around and it was the J-Lo imposter.
“I just wanted to let you know that I think you are a pretty girl. You could be a lot prettier and go a lot further in life if you would consider removing your tattoos and getting rid of that ridiculous hoop in your nose. People won’t take you serious looking the way you do.” And then she waddled off, draped in her gold chains and fur coat, a waft of perfume left in her wake.
Another woman who was on the same flight as me, overheard J-Lo’s comments and just shook her head sympathetically as she walked past me and my gaping wide mouth while muttering “Some people.”
The bright side to spending a small fortune for the pleasure of being shuttled through the heavens in a ridiculously loud and flimsy airplane, was I loved it. And apparently I went from resembling a crack-addicted whore to a pretty girl no one wants to take serious. I learned so much about myself on this trip.
I gotta get me another tattoo. And an eyebrow piercing. When I fly to Chicago this summer, I’m wearing my hair in a mohawk. Maybe if I scare the shit out of the people next to me, I’ll be able to enjoy the thrill of the sailing through the skies in a rickety tin can without any comments from the peanut gallery.
Wasn’t I adorable in stripes at five years old? Gotta love the 70’s.
May 14th, 2007 at 11:56 am
“Well thanks, J-Lo! I didn’t realize that I wouldn’t get far in life. You have saved me from a life of crime and perfidy. Not to mention loud monkey sex.”
Christ. I have neither piercing nor tat but it makes me want some, just to annoy people like that.
May 14th, 2007 at 12:06 pm
What a thing to say! You’re like me, we just seem to somehow invite these people and are too damn polite to say anything, although I think of plenty of smart things to say AFTER the event!
May 14th, 2007 at 12:11 pm
You are definitely polite. In airplanes. Apparently, not so much in hotel rooms
May 14th, 2007 at 12:12 pm
OK, those were some pretty funny in-flight experiences! I heart the way you tell stories, RM. And it looks like you were just as adorable at five as you are now.
May 14th, 2007 at 12:17 pm
That is the exact same smiley face you are making in your sidebar.
May 14th, 2007 at 12:18 pm
Can’t wait to meet you at BlogHer.
May 14th, 2007 at 2:11 pm
Good to hear you had a fabulous (or should I say noisy?!) reunion with your hubby. I think that woman you met? - she hasn’t had good sex for a long time.
Yes, even with short hair and a weird striped T-shirt you are beautiful.
May 14th, 2007 at 2:24 pm
people amaze me, with their capacity for butting in. i’m impressed you didn’t bite her.
and i’m glad you loved flying…and that the trip was worth it, even with your unfortunate (if blog-ripe) seatmates. wink wink. yay.
btw, you were pretty damn cute at five. love the bedhead. i think that would go well with a neck tat and nose ring.
May 14th, 2007 at 2:45 pm
First off - Congrats on the wild monkey sex and you finding out you LOVE airplane flights! Here’s hoping you & Boo make the mile high club!
Now - on to Miss Avon lady (who puts it on with a garden trowel), her QVC Diamonique and her woefully out of season YAK fur coat. F–k her!! And poorly at that! Who in the hell is SHE to judge YOU? I’d have said “Really? So where are your tattoo’s then, you overmade, underpriced slut? By the way - Evening in Paris went out YEARS ago!!!” This calls for a “Jane, you ignorant BITCH” to her!!! Man - I hate people like that. Okay - she really pulled this Kat’s tail!
Much love to ya T, you held yourself together well.
May 14th, 2007 at 2:47 pm
PS - no offense to those that use Avon - it was all i could think of. (trying to pry foot out of mouth, damned bitch rants…)
We walked to our kindergarten field trips - so you with your cute striped shirt and blonde hair had it MADE flying to yours!
May 14th, 2007 at 3:50 pm
Yeah yeah, yer cute, now and at 5 lady, now wheres the picture of the bling??? My anniversary is coming in a scant month and pointing out what others have gotten for years of servitude to Big Ug might clue him in a bit
And I’m not touchin the loudness of the reunion… although several dirty things come to mind. I’d have told the old biddy with the Zsa Zsa jewelry about it, just to see if I could make her choke a bit.
May 14th, 2007 at 3:58 pm
Omg, I loathe flying, after having flown - oh - I dunno - a million flucking air miles or more. My first few flights were fun. Then the honeymoon ended with snotty, self important air hostesses (glorified waitresses in the sky). And, after flying with newborns, toddlers and small children (mine) - there wasn’t any hint of pleasure in it anymore.
Maybe I oughta get my husband to get a job far away and fly SOLO to go see him. I might enjoy it then. Especially if I know we’re gonna have some wild monkey sex.
Glad you had a good weekend and good MSex!
Life’s too short to worry about snotty, self important wenches like that J-Lo cow.
Good on you for not stooping to her nastiness! xoxoxoxo
May 14th, 2007 at 4:08 pm
You are a better woman than I because I would have probably bitch slapped her.
Well not really, but I hope I would have come up with a good comment such as “Huh, J-Lo-wanna-be you must have mistaken me for someone who actually wanted to hear your opinions.”
Glad the monkey sex was all you expected it to be!
May 14th, 2007 at 5:44 pm
Ink or not, you have more life in your right tattoo than she has in her whole body.
Maybe she was in need of some loud monkey sex…oh only if she were that lucky.
May 14th, 2007 at 5:45 pm
I think something ate my comment?
May 14th, 2007 at 6:56 pm
Oh my. I cannot believe she had the audacity. Incredible.
So glad you had a wonderful time.
May 14th, 2007 at 7:51 pm
Nothing says loving like loud, “aren’t you jealous, seriously put the water glass down before you hurt yourself listening through the wall” sex….. AND you got bling….
Ahhhh, it was worth the snotty ole bitty.
May 14th, 2007 at 8:46 pm
Let’s see the bling!!!
May 14th, 2007 at 8:51 pm
“Some people” is right! Maybe she was staying in the same hotel?? LOL.
May 14th, 2007 at 9:03 pm
sheesh. the only chicks i know NOW with tattoos are crack whores.
who doesn’t love a crack whore?
May 14th, 2007 at 9:06 pm
Wow, fashion adventures and advice from the misshapen. Fabulous.
May 14th, 2007 at 9:11 pm
It sounds like the odd odour emanating from the man next to you on the flight was intoxicating.
May 14th, 2007 at 10:34 pm
“I just wanted to let you know that I think you are a pretty girl. You could be a lot prettier and go a lot further in life if you would consider removing your tattoos and getting rid of that ridiculous hoop in your nose. People won’t take you serious looking the way you do.”
“If that means they won’t lookit me like they’re lookin at you, I’M GOOD!! KTHXBYE!”
Effing A I hate people sometimes. YAY for monkey sex, though!
May 14th, 2007 at 11:18 pm
First of all, loud monkey sex is the absolute best.
My honey informed me last week, when I told him about seeing the cows knocking their boots on the side of the road last week, we and dolphins are the only living things that have sex for pleasure. Not even monkeys he tells me. His brain is filled with facts like that so I am apt to believe him but between us, I am always down for some loud monkey sex and am so very glad you got yours.
Sounds like quite the experience with the peeps on the plane. I fly a lot and have to say (knocking on the fake wood desk), I have yet to encounter someone judging me the way that punk ass bitch judged you. She’ll get hers, for this I am sure.
And no matter how many times I fly I still marvel at the smallness and wonder of it all. Simply amazing.
May 14th, 2007 at 11:26 pm
She was just jealous. The old biddy.
May 15th, 2007 at 4:43 am
Glad to hear you had a good night with Boo. You should’ve told her “Even though I may resemble a crack addict and whore with my tattoos and nose ring, I’m not”.
“But I did stay at a Holiday Inn last night so be careful. I just might strangle you with those gold chains around your neck. You stinky old bag.”
May 15th, 2007 at 5:24 am
I love your nose ring … I used to have a tiny diamond in my nose but had to get rid of it to do my student teaching … I miss it!
May 15th, 2007 at 6:07 am
If it ain’t loud, you ain’t doin’ it right.
…and next week, I have an appointment to consult with my artist on my next tat.
May 15th, 2007 at 7:52 am
I don’t think you were the hick my dear. The woman sounds a little crass, to put it politely. If we end up on the same flight to Chicago, I promise not to fart, burp or make rude comments about your appearance. Glad you guys had a good time.
May 15th, 2007 at 9:24 am
In my family, we call that a COMPLICUT. That is defined as a cutting remark cleverly disguised at first as a compliment so as to make the knife hurt all the harder when it is thrust into your back.
May 15th, 2007 at 5:56 pm
Wow. Girl, I give you credit. I’m all for respecting my elders and remaining non-confrontational, but I think I would have decked that woman.
The guy you were sitting beside on the flight there reminds me of my trip home from New Mexico. I nearly shit my pants on that flight…ah, noxious gas. You are my best friend.
May 15th, 2007 at 8:57 pm
Man, all I got was a drunk travel agent and an old guy with half a nose who clamied he was a spy. Some girls have all the luck.
May 16th, 2007 at 6:30 am
My blood pressure just went through the roof.
Oh, the restraint. I don’t have that kind of restraint. I might have knocked out her teeth and then said something like, “You would look much prettier and enjoy greater success in life if you only had some teeth.”
May 16th, 2007 at 12:19 pm
My favorite “critique” came soon after I’d put some red streaks in my hair. My crotchety old woman boss came up to me in front of all of my employees and said, “Why would you do that to yourself?”
“Uh, cuz I don’t feel like looking like a ‘mom’ anymore?”
Later she came up to me and apologized, only the apology went like this:
“I just can’t help but think that perhaps you’re turning off some very handsome men, men who could be doctors or lawyers, all because of your hair!”
I really think that was a compliment on her part but I came back with, “Well, if someone is so hung up on a few streaks of color in my hair, then they’re probably too boring for me to be with anyway.”
Shut her up.
May 16th, 2007 at 9:24 pm
Was that my mom again?! Glad you got some SPECIAL time with Boo and enjoyed flying. It’s not all it should be, though.
May 18th, 2007 at 5:00 pm
“Other than the odd odour emanating from the man next to me, the flight was intoxicating. ”
snort — are you sure it wasn’t the odd odor that made you feel intoxicated?
And you definitely should have told JHo, with a straight face, “Of course I AM a crack whore.” Bet you wouldn’t have had to sit next to her for that flight…
May 19th, 2007 at 7:52 am
And you didn’t bitch-slap her?
June 9th, 2007 at 12:04 am
This is a great blog! Nice to see good comments too.