Thoughts at 35,000 feet, and naming the goodies

I’m going to detail the specifics of the giveway first before I get into the post I wrote on the plane last night, ruminating on my general dislike of flying.  So you don’t have to read further unless you’re interested. 

Goody Giveway:

Anyone who posts a comment on this site between today and December 19 will be entered in a drawing for the following (I may add more but this is it so far):

Advanced Reader’s Copy(ARC) of Coraline, Neil Gaiman’s story in graphic novel form.

Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere in paperback.

ARC of Elvis & Olive by Stephanie Watson.

You can enter more than once.  I’ll mail the goodies to the winners after the drawing.

Even with packing a small box to send home, my bag barely made the weight limit at 46 lbs. 

Books are heavy.  Words do have weight.

Flying Fears

Sunday November 18, mid-evening.  I’m on the flight to Little Rock, feeling happily melancholy.  Melancholy because I’m on a plane, a tiny one at that (although my fellow passengers are a jovial bunch, for which I am grateful) and no matter how I try to get around it or how smooth the flight actually is, I just hate to fly.

Happy because the plane is bearing me home to all I hold dear, my husband, my kids, my cats, my friends/colleagues, my students, and now my mom (last but not least), all at the end of this cloudy rainbow.

Also, I’m on my second glass of wine.

Strangely, I love to travel.  I just don’t like the en route part.  Some years ago I discovered the root of this fear, since, I’ve never had a really bad flying experience to base it on.

But my father has.  Add this to the fact that my father is a great storyteller and you have a terrifically anxiety provoking combination for a little pitcher with big ears.  That is, by the time I was a teenager, I had heard the stories of 1. flying through tornadoes in Louisiana and 2. the landing made sans landing gear in which the priest took out his rosary and began a droning prayer, and everyone was directed to assume the crash position, so many times that subconsciously I don’t think I believed in the possibility of a relatively smooth, uncomplicated flight.  The kind I’ve had, mostly, in the twenty years I’ve been flying, with a lot more regularity than my Dad. Thus, every time I walk off the plane I want to throw my arms around the stiffly smiling pilot and thank him profusely for keeping me alive another day.

So, old habits die hard.  I don’t blame my Dad.  They were good stories.  But at mid-life, I wish I could rewrite the script rolling in my head.  Instead of the mental ground-kissing I do every time our wheels touch down, it would go kind of like this: “Wow.  Another amazing flight.  Don’t you just love to fly?  I do.  There’s nothing like it.”

Well, maybe someday.  There’s always hope.

My friend Monda commented on my use of y’all despite my urban roots.  It’s one of my favorite words, has been since we moved to Louisiana lo those fourteen years ago and in my adopted home of Arkansas, I’ve only come to love it more. So, even though it’s probably not incredibly unique in the blogosphere, I think I’ve found my sign off.

Bye, y’all.