Conversations on Planes

The plane from Houston was filled to capacity. We were on the very last row, the only time in my 14 year of flying that I have ever been at the very back. At the worse, I'm a few seats up from the bathroom, which isn't a bad place to be.

The seats in the back are small, even for small airplanes. I am 5ft11. A smaller guy gets to my seat and points to the window. We both hope (I know I did and I'm sure he did too) that no one sits with us.

Then we see him. He must be 6ft3 or 4 inches tall and he was healthy. He wasn't fat, but he was a big dude. We could see his face drop as he realized he had the middle seat in the smallest seats on the plane.

For a while, we exist in some sort of seat limbo, where we know we will be fine as long as we don't have to move. My entire shoulder is sticking out and I have to juke and jive like I'm playing some sort of plane sport - dodge the butts. But then, of course, the guy by the window breaks the limbo. Window seat needs to use the restroom. We try to get up without disrupting those around us trying to sleep, but that's impossible because the only handrails we could use were the backs of the seats used by sleeping passengers.

They loved us.

So there was no effing way we would sit down until after he comes back from the bathroom so me and big dude strike up a conversation - a conversation that lasted for the remaining hour or so it took to get home. We mainly talked about travel. I'm telling everyone I'm going to South Africa as if the telling will make it come quicker, with the hope that the person I tell may be from there and can tell me something that will make my visit there a different kind of poignant, that will make it hit close to home for me. In many ways, just being on the continent hits home. We'll see how it will be for me.

It's weird that when you are in such close proximity to someone you can either completely ignore them or become the best of friends. Though I had to sit sideways for nearly two hours, killing my back, this was one of the most enjoyable plane trips I've taken. (I can still complain, even when something makes me happy - now that's talent).

Or not.