No, I DON'T know where I'm going with this random memory.
Years ago, I did not fly well. KNEW I was going to die each time a plane took off. Reconciled myself to my fate.
Of course, once the U.S. Army strapped me into a helicopter, with the doors open, tilted it all sorts of funny ways, stopped a few feet above the ground and ordered me to jump out, I got over it.
My kids could never understand why carnival rides bored the hell out of me.
Anyway, random memory, that I randomly walked away from.... ADHD at work.
I forget where it was, but I had to take a short hop in a plane that looked like it was made out of the stuff they use to make corrugated tin roofs. We strapped into seats about the size of half a coffin... er... person each, and a dirty rag, masquerading as a curtain, separated us from the guy in front... I presume, the pilot.
As the tinker toy plane took off, with lots of noise and vibration, and we gained altitude I began to feel a cold spot on my arm by the fuselage.
Took me a few minutes, but, finally with some contortions this old body can no longer duplicate, I spotted the hole in the fuselage where the air was streaming in and freezing my arm.
Which, in turn, reminds me of a trip on a rather rickety-seeming 747 from London's Heathrow Airport, to Frankfurt Rhein-Main. One of the doors whistled all the way... air leak through the door seal, the flight attendant reassured us.
Not sure which inured me to flight... Army helicopters, tin can airplanes, waiting for the door to explode...
Oh, wait, it was my 7 year old daughter, who had once singlehandedly entertained an entire theater attempting to watch Annie, bothering everybody for 8 hours on a trans-Atlantic flight.
Yeah, that's it.
Donovan Baldwin