As I boarded my recent flight
from San Francisco to Orlando, all seemed right in the world. The sun was shining, I was thankful to
actually be on board my nearly missed flight, and I was excited to see close friends
when I landed. Unfortunately, all this positivity
came to an abrupt halt as I made my way down the aisle towards my assigned
seat. Utter panic set in as I realized
my seat was smack-dab in the middle of Disneyland. What the hell was going on here?? Was this a mile-high
daycare center, or a religious commune relocating from California to Florida? My inner survivalist immediately kicked in,
and just as if I had come across a bear in the woods, I started to slowly back
away. But before I could retreat more
than just a few steps I bumped into the person behind me. I heard a man’s voice
authoritatively say, “This is a one way street, darling, proceed.” Sigh… I knew he was right; there was no
getting off the flight at this point. I briefly entertained faking a medical
emergency, or attempting to rile up TSA with the threat of some sort of white
girl jihad. Ultimately however I decided
I’m not at the place in my travel career where I can afford to be put on the
“No Fly” list.
I strive to be a person whose
knee-jerk-reaction is one of grace and compassion, and not disgust and
judgment. So I swallowed my preconceived
ideas, took a deep breath, and warmly greeted the little people that were about
to invade my next five hours. After the
I-want-to-shoot-myself sensation wore off, I was able to get an accurate count:
there were a grand total of seven children in the few rows surrounding my seat. Five belonged to one couple, and two belonged
to another. These families did not seem
to know each other, yet somehow they still managed to end up grouped together
in one section of the plane. Had I stepped
through some sort of throwback wormhole where we tolerate segregation? And more importantly, why the heck had I been
grouped with the family circus?? Had I
accidently said I was nine years old, instead of 29??? Ugh. All questions for another day I
suppose. Immediately, the children were
fighting over toys, mad about seatbelts, and crying- before the door was even
shut. Realizing their shrill screams
would at some point translate into me having a panic attack, I desperately
looked for the flight attendant and mouthed “vodka” to him. He nodded his head and gave me a
compassionate knowing, yet somewhat delighted smile. Kind of like, “You’ve just entered the 8th
circle of hell, lady.”
After the doors were shut, but
before we had started to push back from the gate, Mama Bear (of the 5 pack), suddenly
stood up, and gathered the attention of her five children- all of whom looked to
be under eight years old, including one set of twin boys who looked as if they were
three years old. Mama Bear asked/demanded
that the children all look at her, and then launched into a flight attendant
type speech with them; including props, hand motions and directing the little
monsters to their toys in the seatback pocket in front of their snotty little
faces. “Well, this is interesting,” I
thought to myself… Mama Bear might be
in dire need of some highlights and a lip waxing, and Lord knows her clothes
have to be burned in the nearest dumpster, but she sure knows how to herd her
flock. I was now totally engrossed in Mama Bear’s
address, as were the other adults (who had to be wondering what they did in a
past life to be confined to toddler purgatory). Then, out of nowhere, Mama Bear pulls off
the most brilliant proactive parenting tactic I have ever seen on a
flight. She reaches into her fanny
pack, no doubt obtained at a homeschooling expo, and pulls out a bottle of
pills. Next, she passes said pills to all
five of her children and ever so lovingly says, “Ok babies, remember what we
talked about, airplanes can upset your tummies, so take this medicine so you
feel good and can watch your movie.” Whhhhaaattttt??? It took all my strength to not stand up and
start applauding and give a tearful “hallelujah!” And then just like clockwork, the moment the plane
reached 10,000 feet, she stood up, lifted the armrests, folded her children on
one another like dominoes (using their coats as pillow & blankets) and
started their movie on the center tray table.
Minutes later they were all sound asleep. I asked myself, “Who is this woman
and why isn’t she in office?” I became
so relieved that I decided to pass on grinding up a month’s worth of birth
control and snorting it like a line of coke on my tray table. Who knew, maybe I would even be able to read
my book or sleep??
Unfortunately, just when
peace was washing over me, the greater tragedy of this cross-country flight reared
its ugly head. The other two children sitting in Playland were NOT
sedated. This became clear as the
tyranny of these two monsters began to stretch from first class all the way to the
rear lavatory. The incessant screaming
and kicking and whining was beyond ridiculous. In one moment I came to regret, I even let
the evil three-year-old play with my phone when she asked, naively thinking it might
help her shut-up for ten seconds (BTW mother of the year, why are you letting
your child ask strangers for their iPhones???). I should have known the next several hours
were going to age me several years when the flight attendant told me my cocktail
was on the house. He knew. He was a
master of flight and could obviously sense that the only way these kids would be
silent was if we nose-dived into the vast farmlands of the Midwest. If this was pre 9/11, and I had my metal manicure
kit, I would have headed straight to the bathroom, and tied my own tubes. There is just no sense in risking bringing
anymore demon children into the world.
Don’t misunderstand me; I
love children, and I know children are a blessing, and that occasionally they
are going to melt down. But I can’t
wrap my brain around how a parent thinks they are going to fly from the Pacific
to the Atlantic without a game plan to occupy their horrid offspring. I don’t even take my dog to the park without
bringing him a toy. I understand that
the blessing of my company is just not enough to keep him entertained.
Similarly, I don’t know why
more parents fail to take the “we do not negotiate with terrorists”
approach. Growing up, my family
traveled all of the time. My dad was an
airline pilot (back when airline captains were treated like celebrities), and
with that career choice came the privilege of flying for free. For whatever reason, air travel was a lot
bigger deal then than it is now, and people respected it more. For my family this was especially true
because we were flying as a “non-revs” (the term airlines use for you when you are
a non revenue-generating passenger).
Not only did you travel on a space-available basis, but you also had to
show up insanely early, dressed in Sunday’s best. Being a family of six made the
space-available option much less available and much more challenging. Sometimes we would be split over multiple
flights, other times we’d be on the same plane and spread out from front to
back, and there were even times where we’d be stranded in an airport for
extended periods because there were simply no seats. For me, it didn’t matter whether my parents
were in the seat next to me, or whether they were on an entirely different
flight, I would NEVER dare to be anything other than a grateful angel who was
practically mute. Seriously, these trips reduced my rather extensive vocabulary
to nothing more than a gracious “yes please” and a humble “thank you”. I was given one toy or coloring book
option, maybe a Walkman, and if I had nothing else to do I would sit there and
read Sky Mall like it was the adventure novel of the century. Under no circumstances were my brothers and I
entitled to an opinion, rights, or any behavior that would be fitting to a
child our age. My parents were not
unreasonable tyrants (generally speaking), if we wanted to run around like wild
banshees at home that was fair game; but anytime the general public was
involved, especially the sanctity of flying, there was a clear zero tolerance
policy. Any hints of a whine due to
hunger, exhaustion, or general fatigue, quickly vanished as a picture of our
dad’s bulging forehead vein came into view. The threat of the angry German in
him coming out to display his wrath kept us in check. We understood that this was not a democracy,
and that we had no rights. All of
which makes me wonder why American children today are so pampered and catered
to. They are allowed to actually feel that their opinion matters, anytime
anywhere. I would have never crossed
my parents in public. Not only because it would have meant the premature end to
my soon-to-be-spectacular life, but more so due to the fact that this just
wasn’t something you do.
I managed to control my
tongue and the majority of my body language throughout the duration of the five
hour flight across the glorious US of A (with a little help from the two
complimentary Absolute bottles I received from my sympathetic cabin
attendant). I did however give into
temptation a bit as we landed and were preparing to deplane. I stood up and noticed that directly in
front of me was a little girl, probably around 4 years old. How could this be??? I leaned over the
seat, said hi to the angel, and then I turned to her mother. In a loud
projecting voice I complemented her on what a well-behaved daughter she had,
and explained how I had no idea there was even a child in front of me. I made a point to carry on about how I wished
I had a toy, treat, or tiara to give her “fabulous” daughter. She laughed and said, “She is a good girl,
and she wouldn’t want to do anything that would keep her from seeing Princess
Aurora at Disney World.” Brilliant! I quickly shot a glare back toward the parents
of the two troublemakers, in hopes they were shamed. Fittingly, they looked away.
As I departed to head on my
way, I used the last swig of my cocktail to wash down two extra birth control
pills, deciding the stomachache it would cause would be well worth it.
