It has been 6:30 a.m. twice

I’m at a kiosk here at O’Hare airport. It’s 6:30 a.m.

What is weird is that I left Cleveland at 6:30 a.m. so I’m in some weird freaky time space bullshit or just time zone changes.

I had to cut my trip short because I found out that I got a writing job (for TV) that starts on Monday and I had to get back to L.A. Part of my brain thinks Monday is the day where I find out where I sit and also where they find out that I’m a fraud, not funny and have no ideas except the ones in the packet that they hired me from.

But I got to quit the temp job officially. My temp counselor was concerned. He said I had been working a hard job and he didn’t think they could fill it. I told him I was filing alphabetically and twice a day picking up mail and then the rest of the time was spent photocopying and neatly removing staples from documents with staple removers. He was confused because the company had told him how hard the job was. I said no. It wasn’t hard. They just didn’t want a lazy eye-rolling bitch.

Anyway I don’t remember what I wrote in the last blog but it was genius. Oh, yeah, so that crazy old man at Starbucks was right – (see last blog) I am writing for a living now (or until a firing, a strike, or a cancelling). That man was quite a visionary and I wish I could think, ’Wow. Weird! But it was nothing weird. People say weird shit all the time. I just wanted to hear that – the opposite of “I ain’t trying to hear that.” I’m actively always trying to hear nice things.

Okay, I’m off to buy an orange juice and maybe some magazine about things I can do to my living space.

Some guy just came up to me and asked, “Where is Gate 7?” How the shit should I know? I’m a droopy eyed typer on this kiosk how about asking say………the flight attendants at their stations behind me? Who interrupts someone on the computer? Why would I know where anything is more than him? I have an eye mask on my head. I look mental.

Maybe this is a premonition too. If I’m ever on a game show I’ll be sure to remember to pick “Gate Number 7″.

The gigs in Ohio were great. Maria and I had a blast and althougrh sometimes the audience found us weird or dark mostly people of all ages loved it and the club was super supportive and we had a funny policeman walk us home every night. I kept begging him to arrest people and finally last night he broke up two drunk girls pulling each others hair in the street. Right on!

London Calling

I’m trying to be excited and not worry that my asthma or the cold that I have will act up on tonight’s 10 hour flight to London.
That’s all. I’m mostly over my fear of flying. I’m a maverick around America but I’m nervous to tin bird it overseas. I think I have an agoraphobia when it comes to outside of America – for no good reason. What is scarier than America?
I like hospitals and life-saving doctors around me at all times. Let’s hope this plane has a hospital.

Christmas at the Airport

This is a story about three awesome crazy people I saw at the airport and on a plane on Christmas Day.

I saw this at the airport – on the day that so many people hold sacred, that so many people believe represents light and new hope in the world.

Scenario 1
A guy. If he lived in the South I’d call him a Redneck. But he’s a Bostonian through and through, so maybe he’s a meathead? He has the accent. He’s screaming at a little tiny Mexican lady who was wheeling his luggage in for him from outside. I’m not sure what she did wrong. She put something in the wrong place? But he was yelling at her….”I can’t fucking understand what the F you’re saying anyway. So STOP TALKING”. He gives her ‘the hand.’ And I appreciate his alternate use of “fuck” and then “F”. He continues, “Speak English. I don’t know what you’re saying. Fucking fine. Take my luggage. Throw it away for all I care. I just want to get home. I don’t fucking care! Go away! Go. A-WAY!” He walks off. She walks off. The luggage stays where it is.

I don’t know what happened but it doesn’t take Freud to figure out that maybe someone’s issues come up around Christmas? He just saw his family and now he’s screaming in an airport? Beautiful.

Scenario 2
A man in a motorized wheelchair is at the ticket counter. I can’t hear him but then I hear him yell, “I’ve got to get the fuck out of here! Anywhere! You can’t help me? Bah! Bah!” And he zooms away and starts yelling “Bah” and “Yee-haw” and knocking down the signs that indicate where to stand in line and all the velvet ropes on chrome stands. It’s like a relay race where the goal is to not stay within the lines. No one with authority knows what to do because after all the dude is in a wheelchair. The security guys eventually walk over to him but they are so far away I can’t hear it.

Scenario 3
I’m on the plane, Jet Blue. The stewardess is wearing an antler headband that glows with red lights. A woman wants to sit in the exit row rather than the back of the plane and she asks the stewardess to ask if anyone wants to switch seats. The stewardess goes to handle it but the passenger thinks it’s taking too long (meanwhile the plane has not taken off) and she yells (in a Boston accent), “I’m gonna throw up on your damn antlers if you don’t put me in that exit row!”

I’ll say it again, therapy can benefit everyone.

Two Significant Things Happened within 24 hours

First,

I flew for the first time unmedicated and I did not panic. I took a small dose of klonopin at noon and flew from Boston to NYC at 3:30pm (flight delayed.)

The meds wore off and my layover flight took off at 8:30pm, I remained at 34,000 feet for the next 5.5 hours and suffered restless legs, extreme boredom, frustration that I couldn’t yell louder at the TV my excitement at the Red Sox doing awesome because passengers were asleep. Gone was the panic. I had fun. I did sit back and relax and enjoy the flight. I even had a goddamn cup of Dunkin Donuts coffee. I tested the old nerves with caffeine and I won.

The next night I went to see Morrissey in concert. It’s possibly his last concert in my area as he claims he’s retiring.

I saw him announce that it’s a “statement of fact that the world is full of crashing bores.” Then he proceeded to play live my favorite Morrissey song, one I’ve been waiting for years to hear live. I sang along and danced in a lame way.

Then he played The Smiths song, “Death of a Disco Dancer”. It was an honor and privelege to hear it live. Passionate goths, awkward aging Smiths fans, chubby new Mexican teenagered Moz fans and a drama queen like myself, sang along, thousands of people singing, “Love Peace and Harmony are very nice, very nice, but maybe in the next world.” I had a tear in my eye and I think I had my hand on my heart.

Fear of Flying Possibly Under Control

December 2006

As I gear up for my flight next week (to Boston) I realize that I’m not that nervous. I’m not dreading it. Of course, I rarely dread a Jet Blue red-eye (cozy, cozy, cozy). But I’m realizing that there are more realistic things to fear.

I really think that I have a pretty good chance of being maimed by a celebrity driver. I’m in shock at the amount of celebs who drive drunk in a 5 mile vicinity of me. I live near enough Hyde, Chateau Marmont, The Ivy and all kinds of places that celebs drunkenly get in their cars after being at…and where paprazzi go on kamikaze missions to stalk and drive on the wrong side of the road in black Lincoln SUV’s.

My friends who are in AA have gone into the program with drunk driving stories that can’t even compare to Mel or Nicole. Sometimes my friends drove home extra slow and careful and didn’t remember parallel parking so badly when they sobered up and saw their car the next day. Now they’re praying to a Higher Power and celebrities are going to resort rehab, not quitting drinking and when they do drive drunk…going 100mph? Driving on the wrong side of the road, let alone wanting to get on the freeway? Who wants to go fast when they’re drunk?

I don’t feel safe in L.A. on the roads. I’m thinking I should get an airplane for errands.

Adventures in Flying

Whew! Made it! Three flights this past week. I gotta tell you, the worst part was the melt down I had in a PrimeTime Shuttle on the way to LAX. When I called in to make my reservation for an 11:30 pm flight, they wanted to get me at 8:30 pm. I fought back. Too much. I can’t be at the airport 2.5 hours early. So they picked me up at 9:30. Thought that would be plenty of time.

I had the most neurotic driver. Like a Russian, big, Woody Allen. He rang our bell 10 minutes early. Great. He was sweating. His hands in the air. “The car. It is up the street. A few yards. Can park it in driveway for you.” And without waiting for my reaction, which was going to be, “No sweat dude. My stuff is light. Let’s just walk.” He spun in a circle. Looked at his watch. “Okay. Okay. I get the car. But it’s going to add another five minutes!”

I stopped him in mid-spin. “I got it. We can walk to the van. No big.” He grabbed my suitcase, which had wheels and ran with it, the suitcase extending off his arm like a wing. He got to the van sweating and out of breath. We had to pick up another passenger. We stopped at the next house. Oh, pardon me. It wasn’t that easy. First, even with one of those computerized maps that talks to you on his dashboard, he missed the turn for Orange Avenue 4 times. The voice said, “Re-calculating. Direction missed.” By now, 15 minutes had gone by. We arrive at the place. He is in a fit because he won’t double park and the passengers have no driveway. He debates parking in someone else’s driveway. He does it. It takes another 10 minutes. Now it’s 10pm and I have to be on a plane at 11:30pm.

Neil is calling American Airlines, to find out the absolute latest we can board, but he’s apparantly getting some voice detection option and each time he says “Operator” something goes wrong because our driver is talking. He’s shaming me saying, “We wanted to get you at 8:30 but you said no. This is at your risk.”

I’m saying, “I pay enough money in therapy every week to get over people, including me, shaming and blaming me. I can’t have you doing it too. I also think it’s because we are waiting outside someone’s house who is clearly not home for 30 minutes, part of the reason we could be late.”

I say over and over, “I’m not normally this rude, but I’m terrified of flying.”

He keeps saying, “I know. I know. I can’t leave house until dispatcher says so. I have to wait 25 minutes.”

I start to weep quietly. Neil consoles me. I’m just more afraid that my klonopin is not kicking in. The driver is giggling nervously. He finally agrees to leave. It’s 10:15pm now. We’re driving to the airport. The Talking Map tells him “Left on Fairfax.” he takes a right. Map says, “Re-calculating. Missed turn.” He’s headed away from the airport. Neil says, “Buddy, where you going?” He says, “I know what I’m doing.”

He does this same move two times before I really lose it. I burst into tears.
The driver says, “Okay. Okay. Don’t pressure me. I can’t go fast.” I say, “I don’t want you to go fast. I just want you to stop driving in a circle.”

He reminds me again how I didn’t make the reservation properly.

Then we are on the road. Going the right way. It is quiet for a while. Then he starts to make small talk. “Where are you going? Massachusetts? It’s too humid there..” And he casually, so gently, slips in, “Yeah, so next time you travel with us, make sure to let them schedule the pick-up time. You don’t know. We are running late because we had to pick up other passengers.” Meanwhile, there are no other passengers in the car but about 16 wrong turns in the memory bank of this Talking Map. He points his finger in the rear view mirror and says in translated English, “It’s not always you.” I think he meant to say, “It’s not all about you.” Trust me. I’m all too aware that not much is about me.

I am still sort of weepy just because and he asks me for the third time, “First time flying?” You don’t have to be early for the plane. It takes off at 11:30pm. It’s now 10:45pm. We are fine.”

Ever hear of check in? Security check? We are not fine. We’re not even at the airport. But he thinks he’s our best friend now. He thinks he has counseled me and even though I’ve said it’s not, he continues to tell me how I’ll love my first time flying.

We’re about to take a right on the road that leads us to the airport. His cell phone rings. He can’t find it. He digs. He doesn’t bother to continue watching the road. I watch for us. Just to see what color truck it will be that slams into us. He finds his phone. “Ma! I can’t talk now. I’m busy!”

He misses the turn. Talking Map scolds, “Re-calculating. Missed turn.”

He slams the steering wheel. I cry again but this time I think I’m also laughing. I’m thinking that maybe this man is saving our life. Our plane is destined to go down in a historical American Airlines mishap. Some drunk pilot or faulty screw or the first case of spontaneous combustion. This bumbling fool will have us at the airport as it takes off. We’ll be pissed that we missed the flight until we see it explode in air. Now part of me wants to miss the flight. And part of me wants so badly to be normal.

We arrive at the airport. The traffic is so bad we beg him to let us out at United and we’ll just run to American Airlines. He won’t have it. He’s still telling me to enjoy my first flight and that he’s never seen a woman cry before just because she’d never flown before.

It’s now 10:55pm. We finally make it. We cut in line. The staff at LAX says we can. Some passengers whisper that we are little shits. We get searched and finally begin to board.

The passengers are tired and cranky. It is, after all, bedtime. We have to get on this flight to JFK in NYC and then transfer to another one to Bosotn. The stewardess greats me at the door. I am about to tell her that I’m afraid of flying and require some comforting words. When she says, “Is JFK your final destination? Or would you like to check your carry-on?” I say, “No. I’m going to Boston.” She perks up. “I love Boston. I have two kitties. They are black and white. They are named after the North End. Would you like to know their names?”

The man in back of me who is still straddling the plane doorway and the innertube hallway says, “No.”

She hushes up and scoots me along. I did want to know about her cats names. I found it odd that I met another grown woman who calls them kitties. Who loves black and white ones (RIP Mitty) and names them after Boston. It didn’t matter that the drugs had not kicked in. I knew I had a friendly stewardess on board.

The woman in front of me had a tiny dog. A real live one. I got excited. I unzipped my carry on and took out my stuffed black and white kitty. I put it on the back of her headrest and said, “They can play.” (I think the klonopin had kicked in.) The woman and her dog, stared at me and turned away. Well, fine. I didn’t really want to play with them either. I’m not sure what happened next but I think it involved passing out.

Poor drugless and sleepless Neil watched Failure To Launch (bad title for a movie shown on a plane?) while I drooled against the window dreaming with my stuffed black and white kitty, gauze covered pillow and postage stamp sized blanket.

I’m Totally Zen! Blaaaah

I’m at the airport in Boston. It’s totally re-done. It’s wicked fancy. Sort of like, “Sorry none of us screened those 9-11 hijackers, but check out our new skyway!”

I’m waiting to board my flight to L.A., which is late arriving. I’m hanging onto the last klonopin that I can take before I overdose, wondering how much panic my body can hold.

I see a guy. He’s standing up and flailing his arms. He’s trying to convince a group of guys around him that he’s calm. He’s screaming, “I’m totally fucking Zen! Check it out!”

He holds out his arms and this throws him off balance. He falls forward like he’s doing some mental-case version of the Wheelbarrow (sex or dance move, take your pick.) He shakes it off. “SERIOUSLY. I’M FUCKING ZEN, YOU GUYS!”

It was almost like a bad acting class example of someone being told to act “not Zen.” It was like watching a college football player who is sexually repressed and with a sort of drunk girl in the room yelling, “I’M TOTALLY GONNA RESPECT THIS WOMAN’S RIGHTS! I WILL NOT INVADE HER AND THEN CALL HER A SLUT!”

Then this guy once again yelled, “TOTALLY CALM, DUDES.” But dudes, turned into Duu-hiccup-uuudd-hiccup-uuudesss….splash, blech, blah, puke. Puke on the carpet. Puke in the waiting area. A dozen cops surrounding a drunk and puking guy.

He was supposed to be on my flight. He was too rowdy to board. Good job, Logan airport. I couldn’t help but notice when I sat down that the seat next to me was empty. Great. Beefed up security has cost me the opportunity to sit next, meet and clean up the vomit of a potential soul-mate.

I’ve seen romantic comedies. I know how it works. Young girl, has a boyfriend, doesn’t question her relationship, gets on a plane, just wanting to get from Point A to Point B and then….the least likely guy, the guy with chunks from his intestines on his bile-stained shirt, says one witticism, or mentions that he adores the one book that she loves that her boyfriend dismisses and……it’s true love.

The Turbulence

I haven’t talked about the turbulence that I experienced on my flight from Boston to LA the other day yet. With all my fears about flying, turbulence never bothered me. I thought of it as amatuer stuff, worrying about some wind patterns that seemingly knock the plane about.

I guess I’d never experienced turbulence. Because I felt like God was a kitten and my plane, just a little jingle ball, and that kitten would not let up. I prayed for someone to come around and distract the kitten with some catnip but no one was around.

I spent most of the flight home, awake, but drugged, enjoying a cheese plate, changing channels on the Direct TV, and reading my new short story collection book. And then, as the stewardess tried to hand the man on the aisle seat in my row a gingerale, she screamed and then tried to suck it back in. Like when you can recall an email in Microsoft Outlook. She fell forward and the drink spilled a little. A huge chorus of screams erupted in the plane, as if on the floor, thousands of spiders were suddenly unleashed. These were horror house, roller-coaster, “I can’t control myself” screams.

A man’s voice came over the intercom, “Leave the carts! Leave the carts!” The stewardesses abandoned their carts and sat down immediately. The pilot got on and said he had to figure out the “situation” we were in. I’d never heard it like that before.

Then we dropped, or it felt like it. Like if you were in an elevator and it went down an entire floor, for no reason. Clunk. More screams and then eerie silence after the screams died down. And then, a slight nose dive. Groans, a few gagging noises, people trying not to puke.

I took my barf bag out because I felt like I was back on the Block Island Ferry in Rhode Island (it’s a doozy.)

And then, insane rattling, like we were beads inside maracas. I grabbed my arm rest to hold on, because I was forcibly being slightly ejected from my seat. I accidentally grabbed the hand of the woman next to me, she looked at me. A moment. She grabbed my hand back. I grabbed her elbow and we held each other down.

More screams. I heard a “Jesus!” I heard prayers. I heard children asking, “Are we going to die?”

I heard nothing from the pilot. I thought to myself that intellectually I felt fear and concern, but I was so drugged, I wasn’t having a panic attack. It was surreal. I didn’t know if it was the drugs, or if I was close to death and feeling that serene, “it’s okay” feeling that we are all rumored to have coming to us on our deathbeds. I figured it was the drugs.

The rattling wouldn’t stop. I hit the side of the window, hard. I rubbed my head and realized, I was fully sober. I reached for my inhaler because the panic attack was beginining. And then – bliss. No more screaming. No more turbulence. The pilot came on and told us to sit still just in case.

I felt tense waiting for that next moment of nose-diving but it never came. We landed, rather turbulently as well. I’d venture to say the landing, “sucked” and that’s usually my favorite part.

Now, I know you’ve all had turbulence and it’s normal and not dangerous. But it doesn’t feel good, does it? I’d like to avoid it in the future. And I am becoming less and less interested in flying.

For in those moments, that I pretended were my last on Earth, I decided that it was a powerfully lonely and morbid way to go. I do not desire a plane crash as my “exit of choice.” It’s the worst feeling. When I have panic attacks here on the ground, I often feel a feeling of weightlessness, and of falling, and heck, if it isn’t the same old feeling that nearly crashing in a plane gives me. It’s just not for me, even if the statistics tell me it may never happen.

But since I’ve been back, I’ve been ecstatic and happy. I think the bump on my head was akin to Dorothy’s in the Wizard of Oz. And now, I’m in a wonderful world of ruby shoes, midgets who don’t get paid residuals or even scale for their appearance in a movie, and singing lions. There really is no place like Earth, even if it is terrible at times. And I love my new cell phone. It doesn’t make me want to screen as many calls. I have a renewed sense of joy.

Comedy Plane

I went out of town for thanksgiving to lake tahoe with my boyfriend and his family. Which means, I had to get on a plane.

I realize now as I get older and more therap-ized and more in control of my emotions and fears and learn where they come from and I’m not going to lose gravity on a flight, I just have separation anxiety, etc. I’m starting to fear real things now. Now I have the unpleasant fear of terrorism and plane crashes. Gone are the days where I just worry about Spontaneous Combustion or choking on ice.

I was once hypnotized years ago for my fear of flying. The “doctor” asked me, “Where do you feel most comfortable?” I said, “Onstage or at shows watching my friends on stage. That is my life!” Most psychiatrists (this is what makes me doubt anyone’s qualifications) squeal with glee at this. They say, “Wait a minute. You get on stage and tell jokes in front of people? And you’re afraid of death? You’re afraid of flying?” They usually wipe flop sweat from their brow and chuckle, “I gotta tell you. Did you know that 60% of people polled….” And I finish their sentence, “Are more afraid of public speaking than death. Yes.” By the way, that’s a bogus poll. I have no proof but I think it is. Everyone always says, “Before I die, I’d like to skydive, have kids, and organize a paint-ball team.” No one sets timelines for accomplishments with the phrase, “Before I Public Speak, I simply must see the Netherlands.”

Anyway the doctor led me into a meditation before I “fell asleep.” He told me to imagine that I was entering a “comedy plane” where everything was funny and my friends were performing and I was too busy laughing to bother being scared. Instead in my mind, I began imagining Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper going down when they too were only just flying to perform somewhere and three beloved performers were lost. You’re never safe, not even amongst friends. I laughed a little during the meditation because I was thinking of how in the movie La Bamba, when Ritchie’s brother finds out he’s dead he screams, “Nooooo!” And that part always made my dad cry. He’d lie on the couch and put his palms over his eyes and pretend it wasn’t happening. The “doctor’ caught my laugh and said, “Good. Good. Chuckle. Comedy Plane is just what you need.” And then I fell asleep from boredom the last image in my mind of a prop-plane disappearing into the fog. I woke up feeling refreshed not sure if the hypnosis worked since I drove home in a Honda, not a plane.

As I stepped onto Southwest I could hear the passengers in their seats laughing. It was like I got late seating to a comedy club. I pushed my way through and put my bag in the overhead bin…my klonopin was kicked in and I slumped in my seat and stared at US Weekly unsure how to open it. And then I heard what all the laughter was about. The stewardesses act as comedians. Instead of leading you through the Emergency Procedures, they say, “And you’ll find your security procedures written here, blah, blah, blah.” And everyone laughs. Now that is sort of funny. No one lives if that bird goes down. It doesn’t matter if you have a floatation device or a responsible person near the emergency exit. But her delivery was so dumb that I was angered that people thought that was funny. I don’t think people were laughing on the drug induced conceptual deconstructed level that I was laughing at. Then another stewardess announced that we shouldn’t panic, oxygen is on the way in case of an emergency, “If you don’t bother us too much during the flight.” Big laughs! Then the pilot, who I guess, had nothing better to do than fly a plane gets on, “If this thing takes off, we’ll be cruising at an altitude of xxx.” Ha! Ha! During the flight where we hit turbulence that I swear tipped the plane upside down and back he got on, “Whoops!” That’s not cool. When we landed he said, “Oh great. We’re here.”

Now I had a connecting flight, also on Southwest. I boarded and couldn’t believe it. I was getting a double header; I had tickets to the late show on this plane. The same routine was going on but this flight crew was off the wall. No one bothered with delivering the emergency thing, instead, “There could be an emergency, blah, blah, blah.” The stewardesses were acting like they were on “Absolutely Fabulous” ripping the passengers, teasing, acting campy and irreverent. I was getting nauseous. Comedy is my job. On a stage. We’re on a giant thing that is too heavy for air, stop joking!

But one woman’s hatred of comedy is another woman’s klonopin. The woman in back of me, before take off, said to a stewardess, “Excuse me.” She seemed nervous, like she was approaching Rock Hudson for an autograph. “Were you the one making the jokes? The blah blah?” The stewardess said, “That’s right!” (Imagine Flo from Alice) And the passenger let out a sigh of appreciation. “Thank you. Thank you for the jokes. I needed that. This is where I need to be.”

And in that moment I flashed back to a couch in a certain “doctor’s” office. I pictured him telling me that Comedy Plane was where I needed to be. I still wasn’t laughing but it was a weird moment of recognition. Maybe that $100 wasn’t a waste after all. That weird syncopation made me feel like someone out of the bible. That now I need to write a letter to the Theolossians. Because I was on a flight that was destined to be okay, it had been told to me three years earlier that I needed to be on a comedy plane.

My Flight

Okay, so by reading the first line of this you can probably summize that I did not die in a plane crash on my way to Vancouver.

But I had tricked myself into thinking I was for various reasons that I like to call ‘too ironic to not crash.’

I knew about 10-15 other people flying out to this comedy festival but they were all on the same airline, some on the same flights. I felt relieved too, convincing myself that the other planes would be like the Big Bopper, Buddy Holly planes where semi-legends crash and I, the idiot, would be fine. Then I felt bad for thinking the other planes were crashing and was sure the irony would be that the girl who joined the festival late would get the crashing plane.

My boyfriend convinced me to wear a nice dress on the plane since the flight was in the afternoon – normally I wear pajamas when I fly (I always fly red-eyes) and it seems so comforting. Like 1.) nothing bad can happen in pajamas – it’s just a sleepover or 2.) If I do find my way into eternal sleep well I will be safe, cozy and protected from Hell in my jammies.

But wearing a dress seemed jarring. If the plane crashes it is because I was so presumptious that I’d be seen when I got off. It provides a very uncomfortable outfit for eternal rest. And everyone would be able to see up my dress if we were bobbing around the cabin.

But I wore it because I was doing my favorite exercise, acting “as if.” Mind you it’s just a $9.99 house-dress thing from Urban Outfitters – not a gown – but it is cute. So I acted as if I were a normal person getting on a car, bus, subway and had somewhere very important to be and oh, who me? I get on planes all the time.

I was picked up by the Prime Time Shuttle – a little old man driver who claimed that he was in the Russian Mafia. He called me a bore because I was drinking water. When I explained that it’s only noon he said “Aacchk.” He also said my klonopin would go better with wine. He was upset that my boyfriend wasn’t escorting me on the trip – even after explaining to this man that he has a job (didn’t that used to be a good thing?)

Then Russian Mafia man said, “Why this dress? You don’t want to be comfortable on plane? All cramped up.” He pointed out that if it landed in a desserted field somewhere that I’d have to walk in my high heeled boots. I hadn’t thought of that one.

Then he proceeded to drive 65 mph on surface streets. He got into the same lane with other cars and beeped and stared them down until they had no choice but to pull over. He was listening to some a.m. lounge station and snapping his fingers out the window in a “Hey baby! I’m at the Sands in Vegas – Dino’s on his way over” way. He kept singing along to Sinatra, nearly killing people with his driving. I was gripping the seat, which incidentally was his headrest. My stomach was in knots and I was beginning my panic attack early. Unlike plane troubles, I”ve been in tons of car accidents and they are never good.

I wanted to call 911 from my cell phone and tell the cops to find a Prime Time Shuttle that almost drove through a Jack in the Box from an out of control right turn. The old man also kept insisting that since I was early, he and I should have McDonald’s together.

I felt like it was a bad sign. Then I got to the airport and the ticket guy at the counter wondered why I was so dressed up. He wanted to know if I wanted to be comfortable on the flight. I acted “as if” on his ass and said that this dress was dressing down for me and that I’d be perfectly comfortable. Then he says, “Well, have a safe flight. I hope it works out.”

He hopes what works out? I also felt by calling attention to myself – it made it more concrete that I’d be caught in a crashing plane. “Hey Joe, did you hear about flight 550? Everyone’s dead.” “Oh man, some girl in a nice dress was on there. I just talked to her.”

I got on the plane and by then had taken my klonopin. Like any drug it makes you speak your mind although it also makes you feel like your tongue and jaw need to constantly be moving.

A little Asian woman was in my seat. (I have to sit by the window so that I can sleep and watch the plane land and make music videos in my mind about me ‘coming home.’) I showed her my ticket. She looked up, obviously not wanting to move the needlepoint and books on her lap. She sort of shrugged and made unintelligble English words. “I…uhhh…sorrreee, I uh…..” And pointed this way and that. Until I said, “I got it. You can’t move. I’ll sit on the aisle.” I sat down and watched her read her 1,000 page book in ENGLISH. She also got up to pee which woke me. And in perfect English she said, “Sorry to wake you. I have to run to the ladies room.” And I said to her, “Wow. You taught yourself English in the last hour.” I was half-asleep. I felt good. I felt like I was being rude to someone who probably didn’t deserve it but I didn’t deserve to be on an aisle.

Then I landed in Vancouver and the fun began. More on that later.

I think I’m getting a good grip on my fear of flying. I seem to be less scared when I’m flying for me than for visiting my family. Duh. Obvious.

And I hate that so much of this entry was focused on crashing – my fear is a little more than that but I can’t sum it up in one word, so there you go.