Paul Tuthill lives in Portland, OR, where he partakes in the traditional Portland activities of drinking beer and harshly judging people's attire.  He has a cat, Janie, who does not judge.  He can be found playing guitar and singing his bawdry songs in the band Camaro Island, who will rock you in your pants when you aren’t looking.

Flying (June 20, 2010. Issue 18.)

“Do you know how fast this plane can go? 540 miles per hour. Pretty fast for a propeller plane. Did you know that the jet engine was first used in World War II by Germany?”

This was my introduction to Steven. I don’t know that his name was Steven because I never asked. It never seemed to matter, and it doesn’t matter right now. But if I had to take a guess, his name was Steven.

I sat next to him in my assigned seat. Steven was about 7 or 8, too young to know about the horrors of war, hopefully, but literate enough to know the history of the jet engine, apparently.

“Are you traveling alone?” I asked. I already knew the answer to the question. I already knew the answer to the next several questions I was about to ask. He nodded. “Why are you traveling to Portland?”

“I’m going to my Mom’s house in Longview, Washington.”

“What were you doing in Boise?”

“Visiting my dad.”

I watched as he buckled his seat belt. He cinched the belt, loosened it, then wrung his hands and coughed. I only mention the order because it was the same every time. The same compulsive pattern always preceded the cough, and I still don’t know if the hand wringing was the predecessor to his needing to cough, or the cough followed his need to wring his hands.

“I’m hot,” he told me. “Too bad I can’t take off my jacket.” I asked him why he couldn’t remove his jacket, and he pointed to the sticker that identified him as a ward of the airline.

It was hot. We still hadn’t taken off. “I think you’re ok,” I said. “Just don’t lose your coat.”

He smiled and removed the jacket. I had become the de facto parent figure.

We taxied to the edge of the runway and the engines powered up.

“…crashed shortly after takeoff…”

I should tell you, I am afraid to fly. I don’t understand specifically why I am afraid to fly, and if I knew the answer I would have fixed it. It’s an inconvenient fear. I fly several times a year, and on every leg of every journey I come to terms with my own mortality. It’s exhausting. Medications leave me too groggy when I reach my destination, and alcohol makes me nauseous when flying. In my own defense, my fear does not cause me to avoid flying. I just suffer it.

We were airborne. Statistically we were much safer after 90 seconds of flight. The landing gear was up and the flaps were retracted. I listened for every change in flight status. We banked 15 degrees, too much for my preference, and finally settled on our heading.

“Did you see the landing gear go up?” Steven asked. I confessed that I hadn’t. “It’s cool,” he continued. “The hydraulic changes its shape as it goes up.” I briefly wondered how a 7-year-old knew about hydraulics, but it didn’t matter. Steven wrung his hands and coughed. He adjusted his socks again. He wrung his hands and coughed.

“Do you like to color?” I asked. “Maybe they can get you some crayons or pencils.”

“Not really,” he responded. “Only sometimes,” he said, bored. The plane hit some turbulence.

“…was brought down in heavy turbulence…”

My heart raced. My palms were coated in sweat. My lifespan was surely shortened from the stress. It’s still safer than driving, I know.

The snack cart pushed by us. “Beer, please” I told the flight attendant.

“Coke” said Steven. The flight attendant poured his drink. “Is that Sprite? Because I said Coke.”

The flight attendant smiled. She handed him his drink. “I know what you said,” she replied gently.

I had neglected to bring a book to distract me from the status of the flaps and the degree to which the plane was banking. I started to read the same in-flight magazine that I had read on the trip over. I read the column by the president of the airline. I read each paragraph three or four times. I wasn’t retaining his message, apparently.

“Can I have another one?” Steven asked when the flight attendant handed him his packet of snacks.

“Sure.”

“I’m hungry,” said Steven.

“Did you eat dinner tonight?” she asked. It was 8:30 at night.

“No.”

My stomach flopped again. This time it was not relevant to the motion of the plane. “I’ll go find some more for you,” the flight attendant said softly. I read the 5th paragraph of the message from the president again.

She brought him more snacks, in a cell phone box. They were cinnamon snacks, I believe. He ate them without chewing. My stomach flopped again.

The food seemed to calm him down. The hand wringing and the coughing stopped. He looked out the window as we passed Mt. Hood. “Want to pretend that the plane crashes?” he asked. “But we survive.”

I sucked in my breath. “Sure,” I said. He looked out the window some more. I read about how the airline was striving to meet the needs of its customers. The plane began to shake again. My heart raced. I thought about all I had accomplished, and all that would be left undone. I thought about the life insurance plan I had that would go to the wife and kids I didn’t have.

“…the flight voice recorder was recovered by federal investigators after a two day search…”

There is usually some turbulence as a plane flies through a layer of clouds. The junction between cold and warm air creates a difference in pressure and air density that causes the plane to shake. This happens on every flight, every one, and yet each time I die a little bit. We were coming into Portland. I knew so much about Steven, and he knew nothing about me. I felt the sudden urge to confess my fear of flying, to confess it to myself out loud, to confess to someone too young to judge me a coward. I opened my fool mouth as he turned to me. “Look!” he said excitedly, “The landing gear is about to come down! Watch.”

I closed my mouth. I had no right give him my burden. I remembered a time back before I knew about flight data recorders and smuggled box cutters and wake turbulence. I remembered the first time I flew and the thrill I felt as we were lifted into the sky. I don’t know what happened to that sense of wonder, and I don’t expect to ever get it back. But I knew that a belly full on in-flight snacks had no room for my phobias.

We touched down and slowed to a crawl, as my hands eased from the armrests and my pulse relaxed. “Put your jacket on,” I told Steven, as my last official act as temporary guardian. He was ahead of me, already gathering his bags. The flight attendant came to assume guardianship. He scanned the crowd as he disembarked, solemnly searching for his next parental figure.