In Flight

I wouldn’t really call what I was doing “sleeping.” But it had a warm sound that I lost myself in, until I noticed my mouth was hanging open. With my eyes closed, I wondered if the woman next to me in the red leatherette jacket would notice and possibly find it disgusting. So I woke up, if “woke” is what one does from such a state.

The stewardess was just then wheeling the drink cart by. “Beverage?” she asked. We conversed briefly over the woman in red, who, though clearly Spanish in look and accent, was intently reading her book, the left page an English translation of the Hebrew on the right. I had already decided not to ask or say anything about it, especially not the odd sensation I find the thick Hebrew script somehow comforting.

Did they have beer? Yes. Selection predictably appalling. I asked for the only somewhat skunky import. She leaned down to ferret it out, hesitated. “It’s three dollars.” “Fine,” I said. She handed it to me. “Do you have exact change?” I thought so. “Oh, never mind. On the house.” I’m pleased. Then I remember the small exercise balls I thought to bring. Two small lacquer balls, luminescent, glossy, marbled green, each with a panda, a length of bamboo, and some gold-edged glyphs. I roll them in one hand, then the next, and sip the beer.

The sun glint of the wing in the window and the balls slow and circling in my hand. If I drop them, that would be a drag; the flight is, as the gate attendant informed me, “totally packed.” I’ve never dropped them, not once that I can recall, so I move past that thought.

The glow of the motion, the hum beneath the seat, the beer sloshing in my gut… I am lulled… I hear one ball strike the metal strip under my seat. Shit. I move my bag again and look between the seat and the cabin wall.

I believe this was on the flight out and not on the return trip. Either way one is strapped in and facing forward. I was practicing a kind of attention that felt provisional. My hand found the ball. I put the Baoding balls back in my bag.

The seatbelt light remained on. A plastic cup tipped slightly in its recess but didn’t fall. Somewhere behind me a tray table snapped open, then shut again. I wondered how long we’d been level and whether that mattered. The air felt recycled but consistent. I adjusted my posture, then adjusted it back. The thought occurred that this was what most of my time amounted to: being carried along, not quite sure where or which direction, all the while pretending to be still.

from Notebook 2000