The itch…

Out of boredom today I have been cruising airline websites; daydreaming about taking them up on their fare sale offers.  I do this often as a means of escapism as well as pending winter-stuck in Kansas-self torture.  Typically, about this time of year, I wax nostalgically about airports and the potential they hold.  A part of me truly loves airports.  It could be a greater statement about my genetic make up that I enjoy being at place that’s sole purpose is exchange; bring some in - take some away - repeat.  To me, it’s more than that.  To me, it is the possibility.  I have always loved stepping through the cabin door knowing that when I step through it again, I will be someplace else. 

Having said that, there is so much to hate about the act of airline flying.  The belittling post 9/11 security checkpoints.  The overpriced airport food and drinks.  The crammed seating and the recycled air.  The over talkers, snorers, 1 1/2 seat takers, arm rest monopolizers, the body odor person, etc.  But to me, it’s the bigger picture that I dislike about flying.  It isn’t traveling, it’s transporting.  You aren’t experiencing anything.  You are doing your best, for a given period of time, to both ignore and be ignored until you get to point B. 

Theroux wrote, “I dislike planes.  And whenever I am in one - suffering the deafening drone and the chilly airlessness that is peculiar to planes - I always suspect that the land we are overflying is rich and wonderful and that I am missing it all.” 

That is why I love the window seat.  It’s as close as I can get to experiencing anything other than the dull headache and watch staring that comes with commercial air travel.  Maybe for my fortieth birthday (which is approaching far too quickly) I will do something drastic.  I’ll travel the world.  I’ll make a lap.  I will cross every longitudinal line and will not set a single foot inside of an airplane. 

Man, wouldn’t that be somethin’…