on flying
It's no secret how I feel about flying. I can't even count how many times I've been on a plane just this year. I was getting better about it but I had one of my "I'm going to die" panic attacks the other day. They happen from time to time. This one was from reading the paper and seeing Jon Stewart turning 40 something. I suddenly though god, I'm going to be 40 one day and then I'm going to be getting older and closer to death. And that's how it goes. Something reminds me of my mortality and I have the panic attack for a few days until I forget about it again.
Every little dangerous activity sets off the little panic button in my mind.
freedom to move
I feel the shadow of it...lurking just off to the side but in my periphery.
I was sitting on the plane and a woman was assigned the middle seat. When the doors closed there was no one in the window seat. I kept trying to hint that isn’t it nice to have the space. She said yes it is and sat right there in the middle for the rest of the flight. I was trapped. Trapped by her, trapped by the reclined seat in front which left me with about two inches of clearance from my nose to the head rest, trapped and I hated it.
Trapped by people who don’t give me the room to move freely about the cabin. It's a fine analogy.
to digress
On the second leg of my return flight, I decided not to use the motion sickness watch as an experiment. I was sitting up there at whatever thousand feet planes fly without the little watch to pulse away the motion sickness. I was thinking, 'I will not get motion sick, I will not get motion sick'. I was thinking the power of my mind is great enough to stop it. And maybe it was or maybe it wasn't.
The batteries were dead on everything electronic I had in my possession so I elected to listen to the in flight music offering on channel five of my armrest. What a surprise when Walt Wilkins suddenly began playing in my ears. He's real evidence to me that there can be beauty in this world. Of course I was happy to have something familiar to listen to. He's like my own little personal jesus enchanting me with his messages of love and hope and spirit and earth and that's not too bad to feel from time to time.
He faded away to be replaced by other music and I was left to drift in and out of other things, busy thoughts. I started wondering what that pilot and co-pilot were doing in the cockpit. Cockpit, now that's a funny name. Monday, I had my first female pilot, I wonder if this is a word that will fall prey to PC but now I digress. I was wondering if the pilots were they talking, reading the latest John Grisham fare, or maybe sitting quietly because they didn't like working together? Then, I thought after these last two days talking about change, competition, growth strategies and concepts like knowledge management, would I be happier as a person on this plane knowing there was friction in that room. I mean do people really work better when challenged. With focus because of friction, competition or deadlines, do they really find the best ways to do things and work better? I don't know but I am asking the question inside. And, not just about work. I mean is this why so many people always pick the wrong person to love? The unavailable, "the bad guy", the one that challenges everything you think you believe about yourself, the whatever that inevitably ends. I don't know but I am asking the question inside.
Anyway, so at the end of all this, as we touched down on the runway, I silently said to myself, 'I made it it', feeling once again like I have cheated death somehow. Why is it that I think this way about flying? I think about standing on top of that airport parking garage and shouting at the top of my lungs, 'I survived'. Anything to take back some power over this insane feeling that flying equal inevitable death, to own my fear, let go of trying to control my destiny. Bullshit right? I am full of it. You'd think I'd be a better writer.
Now, I have to take this great synergy and put it to work here at home on the ground in the safety of my home.
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