The Intimacy of Strangers

Flying from Seattle to LAX, falling asleep on the floor and nearly missing my flight should have told me something.   I don’t know what, but something. 

The day before my flight, I spent freaking out.  Like really really freaking out.  Like calling my dad and begging him to come get me and take me home.  I called everyone I knew, they all told me I should in fact be freaking out, that was expected after one quits a perfectly good job without another one and decides to head to Indonesia to write a book.  Now, you are probably thinking, “who does she think she is?  Elizabeth Gilbert?”  No, I actually think I am Barak Obama.  We were born a the same hospital, lived 2 miles apart, apparently aren’t really REAL Americans and like to hang out in Indonesia.   I was thinking of a more punk rock spiritual enlightenment kind of trip like Chelsea Handler meets Guru Gurumuk and then beats her up. 

I had been in an overly friendly mood on the way to LA to catch my connecting flight to Seoul and decided to set myself down between two other passengers in a row that wasn’t mine - at their invitation.  They were adorable guys - early 20s, and had just returned from a bender.  Fan-tastic!  I was in the party row.   We had some fantastic conversations and it made an otherwise uneventful flight bearable.   

Unfortunately, the flight had a lot of turbulence so we had to party with our own personal chemicals.   The ones in our brains, not the fun ones you get for $20 a pop.  Or $10 if you know the right people.  They were best friends from elementary school and were working as nurses in San Diego.  They were perfectly lovely, but they did wind up getting me drunk.   I am perfectly capable of doing that on my own, but I guess chivalry isn’t dead – thanks guys!  In LA, I raced around franticly looking for the Korean Air counter.  I couldn’t find it to save my life.  When I finally got there, I was 10 seconds from missing my flight and the counter lady made me ride on one of those fat people carriers.  It was humiliating, I could have run.  In heels.  It wouldn’t have been the first time I jumped into the wheel well while the plane was taking off. 

So where are we going here?  To Seoul first (does it count as visiting Korea if you change planes in Seoul?).  The whole point of this whole stupid thing was to get some time off, recharge, shut the fuck up and figure out what to do with my life now.  I had blown a dream interview earlier in the day due to my extreme anxiety.  Blew it hard – like a 25 year old sorority girl.  Oh yeah, where are we going here? 

The intimacy of strangers on planes.  It is oddly intimate to sleep next to perfect (imperfect) strangers on airplanes and you wake up to find yourself kind of cuddling next to a Marine Corps Officer.  Or having a row party with two kids from San Diego.  Or sharing a bathroom with the 150 random people on a plane.  It is closer than I get to my family. 

My friend Max always reminds me that I don’t have to like my real family (I do, very much, so don’t freak, y’all), but that I did have to like my chosen family because I picked them myself.  Out of a dumpster or Value Village, but I picked them.  All by myself. 

For some reason, this trip reminds me slightly of the phone call I got from my friend J one morning.  “Jen!  Shit, J2 left me at the airport and took my wallet and my hair is covered in frosting and they won’t let me on the plane because I don’t have an id or boarding pass and I think we were at a strip club playing blackjack and eating cupcakes, but I can’t be sure.  Can you come get me?”  He was in Vegas. 

I have never found that place to be very appealing.  It is kind of like Burning Man (I say as I prepare to be shunned by my entire community of friends who will likely unchose me) where everyone just recounts the things they did at Band Camp over and over and over and over and over and over and over (yeah, it gets boring).  I mean, if you can’t spend your weekends getting drunk, painted blue and hitting the goth roller-derby opera, where the hell do you live?  And why do you still live there?  The housing is cheap?  It is close to your parents?  You live right around the corner from a Linens and Things? 

Vegas is like that too.  Everyone tells you for years and years about all the wacky hijinx they had in Vegas in like 1962.  Or my grandparents did anyway.  I think they went out drinking with Frank Sinatra, got stuck at the airport with frosting on their cigarettes, no money a souvenier cocktail glass.  No cell phones back then so they had to stay for two years – grandma working as a show girl, grandpa working as a dealer.  

So where are we going here?  So, Barak Obama, Elizabeth Gilbert and a rabbi are all on a boat from Densapar to Sumatra with a Bengal Tiger and an iguana or I am merely sitting on a ridiculously long flight between two humans with whom I have shared oxygen and likely mitochondria for 14 hours. 

The intimacy of strangers is an oddly beautiful thing.