Airplanes
I am not what you would call an avid traveler. That is to say – I am a homebody who understands that to experience real Fish-n-Chips and snorkeling – I must leave my quaint little city on occasion.
The past few months, however, I’ve been doing a bit more traversing than usual. And naturally, along with all the traversing, comes some observations.
Just this past weekend, I hopped on a plane to ol’
Anyway, I packed light, managed to make it through Security without any cavity searches and got to the business of reading Vanity Fair. I flew my most favoritest airline, Southwest, and had the great pleasure of choice seats, singing stewardesses and even a George W impersonator. Southwest rocks my sheltered little world.
Anyway, after we boarded and I got a leggy exit row seat – I noted a semi-handsome fellow swaggering down the aisle (“Dum Dum Dum-dum. Dum Dum Dum-dum…). He was tall with dark hair, scruffy facial landscaping and broad shoulders – which is all good in my book. That is to say – all good if you’re in a bar or perusing the shelves of your local Books & Coffee store. This is not, however, an ideal seat neighbor. I immediately shoved my nose in my magazine and tried to avoid eye contact.
To no avail.
It was a nice try, but nobody is just gonna let an exit row seat pass them by – even if it is in between a seemingly annoyed magazine-reader and an elderly woman with black jeans and navy socks.
My new Boyfriend (What? I didn’t call him “Boyfriend” to his face – chill out already), ahem, my Boyfriend settled in, shot a Crest Whitestrips smile at me and proceeded to do exactly what I’d feared he would do.
He grabbed his book and landed his elbows on both of the arm rests.
Seriously.
Now, I get that armrests aren’t just there for show. But neither are they there for men to hog up and start spilling over into your seat area.
Armrests in airplanes were created for one divine reason – to keep strangers from touching each other. It’s simple really. You climb onto a flying apparatus; you find your seat – which is smack dab in the middle of 150 people you never met before. Just a bunch of people who happen to be heading in your general direction. Armrests were invented to keep my bits from touching your bits and vice versa. No touching of bits. At least not until the second vodka tonic.
The reason I know that airplane armrests were not meant to be used for the resting of arms is because there are four of them for three seats. I’m no mathematician, but most the folks I know have two arms. Two arms times three people equal six. That’s six arms and four armrests. Something just don’t add up.
But what two arms do you suppose were cemented on the middle two armrests? Ah yes, my Boyfriend’s.
Something in that Y chromosome makes it impossible for a man to forego the armrest and simply cross his arms across his chest. This would, amongst other things, free up armrests for the ladies. Not that we’d be so bold, but since our breasties make it damn near impossible to fold our arms across our chests – it wouldn’t be such an outrageous idea. Now would it?
Aside from all of the armrest hogging, my Boyfriend was actually quite nice. We smiled coyly over Sudoku puzzles and I hardly minded that he kept interrupting me and making me pause “Single Ladies” (which was on repeat almost the entire flight.) That is until the last few minutes of our flight. While we were all busy returning our seats and tray tables to their full and upright position – he was busy elbowing me every few seconds. I swear, I think even the color-blind old lady on his other side mouthed something a skosh more truck driver than happy granny.
That was it. I had had it. I couldn’t allow this to go on one more second. Right then and there I broke up with him. Sure, he never knew we were dating in the first place, but still – I am quite certain he could tell by my raised eyebrow that we would not be buying matching Lexuses or making adorable, broad shouldered babies. (For which my womanly areas are thanking me.)
That would be positively the last time I dated a boy on a plane. I have most definitely learned a lesson. And I hope if I ever fly with you – you’ll remind me of this story if I start flirting over Sudoku puzzles in the future.
