Flying High on Love

Excerpt from Bears, Bobsleds, and Other Misadventures, Chapter 10

My wife Babe’s idea of a romantic evening is going out for dinner and then to the symphony. In Paris. Or an evening stroll beside the lake. In Copenhagen. Babe loves to fly. Needless to say, according to her, we’ve not shared many romantic evenings. Just so you understand that I am a romantic, early in our marriage I surprised my wife with tickets to the Moscow ballet. In Toronto. By the time I paid the ridiculous amount for the ballet tickets and a hotel near the concert hall, I maxed out the credit card to get plane tickets on the redeye flight.

Babe had never flown before. Apparently, her father believed if God intended us to fly, he would have given us free tickets. So, when we walked into the airport and security guards surrounded me, she presumed this was normal airport procedure. It is my normal. And when I made my way through the security check, they frisked, x-rayed, and in other ways abused me. “It is just a random security check,” I called to her as men with guns hauled me away.

As I boarded the plane, I saw Babe sitting in a window seat of the second row from the back an arm's reach from the loo. She looked relieved to see me. I got a glimpse of the badge and gun of the man who got on behind me. I whispered to Babe when I sat down, “The man who just sat down across the aisle from us is an air marshal so you don’t have to worry terrorists will hijack the plane.”

“Hijack?” she asked out loud, her eyes wide like she had never considered the possibility. Everyone on the plane turned to look at us. The marshal leapt to his feet.

“She is a little worried. That’s all,”   I explained. The marshal sat down slowly, never taking his eyes off us. The rest of the passengers went back to memorizing the safety brochure while patiently waiting for the plane to take off.  As the plane gained speed down the runway, Babe crushed my fingers with increasing force. When the wheels lifted off the tarmac, I said to her, “The pilot is in control now. You can ease off on the throttle.”

“That wasn’t so bad,” she said.

“Just relax,” I said as I pried her death grip off my fingers. “Flying is safer than driving. Flying is totally uneventful.” When the stewardess came around with headsets for the movie, we turned them down. I told the stewardess, “It is midnight, and we are going to sleep.”

Behind us sat a mother and a small boy who kicked the seat continually. I think the boy kicked the seat from time to time too. And then movie started. Everyone watching the dark thriller gasped and exclaimed, “Oh no. Don’t go in there. Look behind you. Look behind you now!”

After an hour of watching the movie in silence, other than the gasps and shouts of admonition from the audience and the toilet sounds from just behind us, a rather robust woman came down the aisle. I admit I was a little curious how she would fit through the tiny washroom door. And I could not imagine how she would sit down. For a brief while, part of her posterior was smushed against my shoulder, but she wiggled and squeezed her way into the washroom.

No sooner had she closed the door when the intercom came on and the captain announced, “Ladies and gentlemen, we appeared to be heading into a thunderstorm and might experience some turbulence. Please remain in your seats with your seatbelts fastened.” Babe again crushed the fingers of my left hand. “Turbulence is fun,” I reassured her. “It is like riding a bull, but without the possibility of being gored.” She did not seem reassured, but then she is a city girl and lacks personal experience with the sharp points of an angry bovine.

Immediately the plane shuddered and shook. Then it plummeted like the drop of doom ride at West Edmonton Mall. The oxygen masks deployed from the panels above us at the same time beer, soda, and bad coffee, now free from plastic and paper cups, went skyward. Babe stopped screaming after the stewardess tucked the last of the oxygen masks back up where they belonged. Then I heard a tap, tap, tap behind us, and a voice calling, “Help me.”

I pushed the button for the stewardess. “I’m a little busy at the moment,” she said looking down at me and obviously annoyed as she continued wiping the mixed drinks dripping from the ceiling above me. The angle of the climbing plane meant and every bit of liquid that hit the ceiling now wound its way like meandering streams to the spot above me, then dropped off a bolt in the ceiling.

“The woman in the john is calling for help,” I explained.

The stewardess seemed delighted to leave the sticky brown liquid dripping on my head like Chinese water torture. She tapped on the lavatory door. “Are you all right in there?” she asked. (I wanted to say, “She is fine. People call for help when they are fine.”)

“I’m stuck,” the woman said. (I wanted to say, “Eat more fiber.”)

The stewardess opened the door a few inches, stuck an arm in and tried to figure out the problem by Braille. She quickly discovered that the woman took up the entire space so she closed the door and called the other stewardess over. The second stewardess held up a plane blanket which obviously came from first class because it wasn’t the facecloth-sized blanket the stewardess had offered me.

I stared straight ahead as the stewardess opened the lavatory door, took the woman by the hands and tried to pull her off the bowl. She didn’t budge. Then the stewardess put her right foot against the doorframe, took the woman’s hands and reefed on her. At this point, the stewardess’s thigh touched my cheek. Because Babe sat beside me, I didn’t have to explain to her this close proximity to the stewardess wasn’t my idea. Even so, Babe glared at me. After a few moments, the stewardess gave up, closed the door again, and went to get the steward.

The steward held up the blanket. The stewardess closest to the air marshal put her left foot against the open door and took the woman by the hand. The stewardess closest to me put her right foot against the door frame behind me and her thigh against my cheek. Babe put her hand over my eyes.

In unison, the stewardesses counted to three and reefed on the woman. The big woman’s cheeks coming free from the suction caused by the change in altitude sounded like a cork coming out of a giant Champaign bottle. The stewardesses yanked the woman to her feet, and she spun out of the bathroom door with her panties around her ankles, knocking one stewardess unto my lap and the other onto the air marshal. The steward, still holding the blanket high, had no idea that behind curtain number one, a large woman toppled backwards towards him with her feet tied together.

The blow knocked steward backwards spread-eagled and he landed with a thud a fraction of a second before the woman landed on her back between his legs, her head on a soft spot. Fortunately, the whoops, cheers and clapping of the passengers drowned out the steward’s expletive. And drowned out Babe telling the stewardess in no uncertain terms to get off her man, as she shoved her off my lap.

A romantic weekend away did wonders for our marriage and I recommend it. Babe liked it so much she made me promise I would never fly without her.