A Plane Ride and A Screaming Baby

I’ve been traveling a lot recently. I’ve been visiting friends and going to weddings and generally enjoyed a packed social schedule that has been more hectic than normal. I’m not complaining; it was sweet. The traveling has eaten into my writing schedule though so I’ve been a little M.I.A. here (Sorry Ascher!)

Good thing for you though, dear readers, is that traveling stirs the soul and fosters creativity. Some of the great writers in the world found their masterpieces either On the Road (sorry everyone else for that pun) or soon after. While I am still mining the well of culture and growth gained from jaunts to New Orleans or New York City for some less snarky work, my first contribution is going to be about babies. Specifically, I’ve been on five airplanes in two weeks. Three of those airplanes had a lot of babies on it. Two of those baby-ridden magic tubes of transportation had screaming babies on it. Screaming babies are not good for resting, processing or writing.

Here is an examination of my mental state from boarding to disembarking.

1) UH OH

We sat down on the plane and I started to enjoy my nice window seat. “Oh look it’s so nice with the lights and the activities and the baton guy making sure we can see his sweet batons.” “WAAAAAAAAHHH!!” This baby starts up in the back and my heart drops. You know the feeling. That look into the distance and the cold sweat that starts to break out on your neck because those planes are so fucking cold for no reason and you just know that baby is going to cry this whole flight.

2) DON’T PANIC

“Come on Erdi. You’re panicking. Don’t overreact.” I’m trying to reassure myself that this is an entirely unjustified reaction after one scream that Davey Havok would be proud of and believing in the goodness of humanity and the capability of this little banshee’s parents. Everything is going to be OK. He or she is going to sleep and we are going to have a peaceful 10:30 PM flight.

3) I SHOULD BE ASHAMED OF MYSELF

I say that because, come on, I was clearly overreacting and I am some kind of monster. What kind of person hates babies? I don’t hate babies I just hate screaming babies on airplanes and other enclosed spaces. Oh man I’m probably claustrophobic or something and I don’t even know it. Haha come on, just relax it’s all going to be over soon you can nod off and sleep since you can’t clear the fucking jellies on that level of Candy Crush anyw-

“WAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!! Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn!!!!!”

4) I WAS RIGHT

“We haven’t even taken off yet and I am considering violating federal law my mom was right I really should invest in some better headphones or maybe if I wasn’t too lazy to put music on my phone in the first place I can’t believe my iPod broke I could be watching True Detective right now or something else I don’t even care. No wonder people shell out 300 dollars for noise cancelling headphones. Damn this baby is good they should audition her for a horror movie or something.”

5) IGNORE IT

“This is truly ridiculous. I am a grown man and my entire headspace has been consumed for the last half hour by a 12 pound baby but that’s because I am trapped IN A METAL TUBE 31,000 ft IN THE SKY GODDAMMIT! No, no, no. Calm down. We’re not doing this right now. Look maybe you can hit enough 5 in a row’s to clear that level but the corner jellies are the worst I hate this game who invented Candy Crush anyway Bejeweled had that shit on lock. Look, see you got this, you have like 21 moves left and there are only about 9 jellies on the board. “

6) HOW HAS NO ONE SAID ANYTHING YET

“Lady, this is not the time for the Ferber method I hate your ugly face and your ugly baby screaming its head off it’s just looking for attention and whatever you’re fucking doing is not helping. Why don’t you just fix it? There are 50 people on this plane wishing you had used birth control.” I’m not proud of this time in my life. I’m not saying I was right to feel this way, just that I was feeling it uncontrollably.

7) FUCK YOU PILOT AND YOUR USELESS ANNOUNCEMENTS

Just when he or she (or most likely it) had started to calm down, people were beginning to breathe a sigh of relief and the night was looking better at last, this asshole comes on the speaker for the 17th time about seatbelts and how we’re 90 miles away and we are going to arrive on time. Motherfucker you don’t need to announce that things are going well. If we’re going to be late then ok, tell us. If you magically got us there 20 minutes earlier ok that’s cool too. Why the hell would you come on your loud ass speaker system just to say “everything is a-ok folks?” It’s because you’re a sadistic prick. I heard you laughing maniacally after that baby started up again. I heard you and your demon laughter while you’re all safe up there in your pilot cage and we’re back here slowly getting our souls sucked out by the worst kind of Buffy villain.

8) I AM NEVER FLYING AGAIN

It’s the typical refrain right? Just like after a bad night of drinking you say to yourself “no more.” Well that sounds well and good now. I’m still hearing the ringing in my ears (like how is she so loud? How is that physically possible?) and the demon pilot of fleet street is grinning at us and trying to coddle this baby as we’re waiting for our bags after this hell-flight because he KNEW IT THE WHOLE TIME HE REALLY DID. The baby finally quieted down as we’re heading out of the terminal to ponder our lives. But that’s the problem with flying. It’s fundamental. Regardless of the fact that this baby made me miserable and the TSA confiscated my bottle of conditioner that I bought from a sweet store and it was $30 bucks down the drain because of stupid, ill-thought out liquid laws and my frazzled status is best described by crazy run-on sentences, I need to fly. We all need to fly if we need to go across this great, huge land. NYC to Columbus is like 16 hours. No way. It was a 3 hour flight after the connection.

Oh well. I still hate you demon baby.

Tags : airplane, baby, Miscellaneous, Problems, ramblings, rants, Screaming, struggles, Travel