Flight Fancy
8:30pm — Are you seeing anyone, by the way?
8:45pm — I hope you don’t me being too forward, but I only asked because I had such a great time talking to you yesterday during the flight. You were so easy to talk to and I didn’t want to miss my chance.
Most of the in-flight romances I have encountered in my life have stayed strictly on screen. And when I mean “on screen,” I mean as in on those flat screen TVs sitting right in front of your face.
To start off, I have never given the thought of meeting a man on a flight. I’ve always prioritized comfort over beauty when I travel, so the very idea of dressing to impress for economy class is just bogus. My version of being “runway ready” for a six-hour flight consists of an au naturale face, an oversized sweater, black leggings, and my beat-up Adidas sneakers. Plus a large emotional baggage of anxiety because I always dread hiccups at security (an irrational fear, of course, but completely understandable). Theoretically speaking, everything about the outfit alone should say, “Leave me alone” rather than “Pick me up.”
So when a guy I sat next to on a flight from Amsterdam to New York two years ago expressed genuine interest in me, I thought the world had gone upside down.
I remember the moment he arrived at the seat next to mine. Tall, blonde, and lean, he moved with fluid ease as he stuffed his belongings in the overhead cabin. I was in the window seat already, dressed in my usual flight clothes but with the addition of glasses, oily and disheveled hair in the shape of a bird’s nest, and a runny nose from a small cold. As he sat down, he smiled politely and said “hey” to me. I noticed he had a tattoo sleeve on his left arm.
For the first two hours of the flight, nothing happened. I was busy trying to solve a sudoku puzzle on my iPad, grateful that he hadn’t minded me blowing my nose every five minutes because of my cold. On the other hand, he was quietly reading a book. It was a classic flight scenario like anything else: two strangers sitting side by side in compatible silence, tucked within the limiting confines of uncomfortable economy class seats.
And then, there it was. A sudden jolt followed by a session of aggravating turbulence sparked a budding conversation.
“Wow,” he said to me after it was all over. “I haven’t felt turbulence like this years.” He had an American accent.
I sighed. “Same here.”
“Not a fan of turbulence either?”
I shook my head. “No. Small ones are okay. Crazy ones like this that get out of control make me want to puke, though.” I blew my nose, this time more self-consciously. But he still didn’t seem to mind at all.
“Well, I’ve never puked on an airplane,” he said, laughing.
“Oh believe me, you don’t want to. It gets messy.”
“Yeah, I can imagine,” he said. “I’m Matt, by the way.”
“Vivian,” I replied back. “Nice to meet you. Sorry, I’d shake hands with you, but I just blew my nose.”
He laughed again.
As it turns out, Matt was an American naval officer traveling from Naples back to the U.S. for Christmas. The fact that he was stationed in Italy alone gave us plenty to talk about. It was no surprise that the both of us miss authentic Italian cuisine. We exchanged information on the best gelaterie, reminisced our visits to Rome, and recounted our numerous failed attempts at Italian when we were lost inside train stations. We even bonded over our mutual disdain for the Americanized Italian chain restaurant Olive Garden. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but something about him made me feel completely at ease, like catching up with a friend I hadn’t seen in years.
Matt also shared stories of working in the U.S. navy, which I knew very little about. He was a submarine pilot. Due to the nature of his job, some of his trips prevented him from seeing sunlight and having access to internet for weeks, sometimes up to a month. The concept of it all was fascinating, to say the least. Underwater tours meant he’d have to download as many albums as he could off Spotify and bring piles books or DVDs as offline entertainment. Whatever he ended up not bringing would have to wait until the next month.
“I can’t imagine going four weeks without internet,” I said, shaking my head at him. “That’s just crazy to me.”
“It’s crazy, but it’s also not. In this age where people’s emotional health relies on the existence of the web — it’s just not right. Give me a book. Any book. And I’ll enjoy it. I’ll enjoy a movie I downloaded on my laptop, too. But people these days just don’t have a good grasp on reality anymore. That’s what gets me.”
Then I tried to go David Attenborough on him. “Do you ever hear whales singing while you pilot the submarine?”
“Yeah, I do. Actually, all the time. But it’s not the whales that bother me the most.”
He made me guess which animal he was referring to, but I couldn’t.
“Shrimp,” he finally told me.
“Shrimp! Get the hell out.”
“Shrimp. You can hear them making these popping noises every time they shoot themselves into a new direction. I hear them everywhere during the underwater tour. While I steer, while I eat, while I sleep. I can still hear them now.”
I was mind blown. “Something that small and insignificant can bother you that much?”
“Yeah, it can.”
I continued peppering him with more questions. “So how deep has the submarine you run ever traveled?”
Matt pressed his lips together. “I actually can’t answer that. That’s classified information.”
“Ah,” I heard myself say.
I remember Matt and I continued our banter for at least another two hours. At one point, he shared with me a playlist he had downloaded for his most recent tours. There was one track that was ten minutes long. I no longer remember the title of it or who it was by, but we sat together in silence, enjoying the musical journey together through a pair of earbuds.
He opened up to me about his long-term ex-girlfriend, who recently came out as a lesbian. Truth to be told, it was a heartbreaking story to hear. The ex’s parents had disowned her after coming out, so of all people, she turned to Matt and his parents for help and emotional guidance. Never in my life had I met a man whose ex decided that she wanted to be a lesbian. It’s like Ross Geller’s scenario from Friends, only this was a real story.
In return, I told him about a heartbreak I experienced with an Italian local many years ago.
“How much crap have you gone through exactly to be so blasé when you talk about this guy? Most girls talk about their exes who’ve cheated with so much spite.”
“It’s a long story,” I replied. “I know it sounds crazy to say this, but I am actually on really good terms with him now.”
Matt laid back against his seat, widened his eyes, and let out a long exhale. “I don’t know how you did it. Cheating on a girlfriend of five years like that… that bastard would be hard to forgive.”
“Believe me, I didn’t think I’d be friends with him again after that,” I said. “But it took a long time for me to come around.”
He then turned to me and said, “You know, I’ve never talked to a stranger on a plane for this long before. Usually we don’t talk at all, or the person is super weird and the conversation lasts less than ten minutes.”
I laughed. “I feel the same way. Thanks for tolerating me, then.”
Matt and I kept each other company after we arrived at John F. Kennedy International. We exchanged numbers at baggage claim, and hugged each other goodbye. It was friendly parting, nothing sentimental or dramatic. I wished him a safe journey back to Boston, where he was traveling to as his final destination for the holidays.
A day later, I received a text from him.
Are you seeing anyone, by the way?
15 minutes later, another text followed:
I hope you don’t find me being too forward, but I only asked because I had such a great time talking to you yesterday during the flight. You just seem so easy to talk to and I didn’t want to miss my chance.
I don’t keep in touch with Matt anymore. The last time we spoke was when the pandemic had just broken out, and I had asked if he was doing well while stationed in Naples. Thankfully, he was okay. In the end, I didn’t reciprocate the feelings he had for me from the time we met, but I still look back at it all with fond memories. If anything, it’s because he blessed me with three life lessons I now treasure.
First, there is nothing better in this world than the feeling of being understood by someone. When you meet a person who you can share a conversational chemistry with and can ride the same intellectual wavelengths as you, it’s like magic. You feel infinite, appreciated, and not alone. I rarely went on dates back in New York and almost forgot what all of that felt like, what it felt like to open up and discuss topics deeper than surface level-talk such as the weather or someone’s outfit. Hell, when was the last time anyone met someone in a random place and was able to strike a conversation for more than two hours? Matt reminded me that it’s possible to find people like this in the world. You just have to be open minded enough to find them.
Second, telling someone how you feel is powerful. Beautiful, even. With courage as a catalyst, there is nothing to lose, especially when the truth is worth telling. Truths eradicate doubts and all of those crazy what ifs or if onlys. You see, we’re all only human. I wish I could pull a Professor X or rope in Wonder Woman’s Lasso of Hestia to reveal what’s on people’s minds, but I can’t. Our only superpower is knowing how to communicate, and if we don’t use it to our own advantage — well then, God help us. I learned my lesson the hard way a long time ago when I waited three years too late to tell someone how I felt. This is a mistake I’ll never make again.
Third, take chances, because so much of life depends on the choices we make. A decision to speak up or not speak up can make all the difference. After all, there is so much out there in the sea of unknown. Whether we choose to embrace those chances is and will always be up to us.
Not all flight fancies end up in love. Some leave you with priceless, intangible gifts instead. And that’s exactly what Matt did.
