Full Moon Flight. Somewhere, Flight Level 390, 2014
No, not the above image. I refer to the one below… (Patience! Don’t scroll down yet!)
To me airline travel is a not-so-minor miracle. You can get literally a world away in a matter of hours (well, less than a day). As we use up our petroleum stocks, who knows how many folks will be able to enjoy this miracle, flying off to exotic, erotic, toxic, bucolic, and neurotic locales?
Sometimes airline travel can seem a bit romantic (at least to me)…neatly dressed pilots, crowds of strangely-dressed folks from all over the world heading off to destinations all over the world…odd-sounding languages sprinkled here and there…the sound of the engines as a jet climbs away from the runway…the anticipation of new and unexpected experiences…
On the other hand–and this is where I get to my question “Is this art?”–it can be quite mundane. WAY more than that, even. It can be gross and revolting.
Just suppose you happen to be sitting behind a family with children. Just suppose those children have never flown before. Just suppose they are a little anxious and nervious. Just suppose the cabin is a little warm–the air conditioning is not quite keeping up with the metabolisms of some 200 bodies. Then, just suppose we fly through a bit of turbulence on the landing approach.
Finally, lets also suppose they couldn’t quite get to the bags in time.
So, is this art?
Late With the Bag(s). Atlanta Airport, 2014
Postscript: After the flight, while in the slow snake line curving in to Customs and Passport Control, I couldn’t help sensing via my sensitive nostrils, that a certain, distinctive, “perfume” was following me. My overly traumatized imagination? Nope. Sure enough, when I made the above image, I had set my briefcase down in the seat just above the horrid scene to pull out the camera. I did so not realizing that the colorful “ejecta” had not only landed on the floor–the seat had been targeted as well (“collateral damage”).
Nice.
God, how I pity the cleaning crew. (In my Air Force days, the student pilot who upchucked in the cockpit got to clean the cockpit him/herself.)
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