Flying East

Flying East, it doesn’t take long to pass into darkness even when take off is as early as 1500 in the afternoon. I’m on Lufthansa in seat 11B. The plane is an A380 which means upstairs.

The food is excellent and elegantly served.

My iPad and phone start with a complete charge. Turning down the opportunity to pay thieves rates for WiFi I elect an audiobook instead. Noting that it is now 0332 in the morning (Frankfurt time) I should consider sleep. It is about that time that a parent from down stairs is insisting that the cabin attendants open the emergency kit for some medication. It turns out to be a teething child. Unhappy and a disruption to the surrounding passengers but hardly an emergency.

This parent was not a teenager: in fact I was having an interesting time deciding if she was the mom or grandmother (having been an older mom, I am sure that more than one person mentally asked themselves this question). This completely begs the question of why you would travel unprepared. It isn’t that hard to bring liquid pain reliever, teething meds or comfort chews for that age. The cabin attendants obviously have seen worse: one bottle for a 12 hours, no diapers, extra change of clothing. All of us had flown when our children were young. We all traveled with at least 24 hours of supplies. Heading to locations with bad weather? More. We had to settle for apple quarters as something to gum. I headed back to me seat hoping she had enough sense not to let him choke if he managed to bite off a small chunk.

Seeing clouds followed by snow and sleet on landing did not exactly thrill me. I traded sunshine and lovely weather for this? Perhaps George has a point about winter weather in the East Bay. Not that I am going to admit it in public.

To top off my travels, my first bag which was primarily luggage coming back to Germany arrived promptly off the belt. My second did not arrive. Baggage tracking informed us (the lonely three passengers left) that the band had hit a snag and they were fixing it. Wait, our bags would arrive.

Right.

Meanwhile, George had driven to the airport and is waiting for me. My phone is dead and there are no visible outlets for charging anywhere. I am offered the desk phone.

But his number is in my phone…..