Travel light, but take everything with you. Don't check bags in for the flight. Have everything in a small case you can take on the plane. That way there could be no lost luggage. No waiting an hour after the flight had landed for a bag that might have been used as a punchbag by some snotty flight attendant. Despite this, air travel was exhausting.
He should have known it was coming. Fatigue setting in. No doubt due to the lacing of his shoes and rethreading his belt into his trousers for the third time. Collecting of belongings from conveyors and plastic trays, like bizarrely inedible happy meals.
Queue after queue, waiting to be let into the next area to wait. And queue. The edge of hysteria, fluttering next to the desire to make jokes about bombs. Something NEVER to be acknowledged. Not unless you wanted a whole World of grief. Didn't stop it taunting/tempting you. Like laughing at funerals. To be noticed then ignored.
More bloody waiting. For plastic snacks, terrible coffee, and squashed knees for more hours. That temptress is beckoning again. Sultry whispers of what fun it would be, what a story there would be, if... something went wrong!
If this note were somehow to survive...
I wrote this at Schiphol Airport waiting for the Istanbul flight. This one went smoothly (and FREE WiFi!), but the worst time was when a body was discovered in the hold on the aircraft we'd just boarded, as ground crew emptied incoming luggage to stow ours. We were, for Health & Safety reasons, not allowed to leave the plane for two hours! Then the aircraft couldn't be used, we missed the flight and had to travel the next day. Bloody inconsiderate
of the corpse! :-) You can't make these things up!
An audio version of this story is at
https://audioboom.com/posts/1061740-audiomo-15th-november-death-at-20000-feet-angie-baby-special-lady-two-6-minute-stories
I do all sorts of things. Mostly badly. Mostly better than others. I tell stories. Occasionally, I lie.
Travel light, but take everything with you.