For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. A butterfly in Chicago flaps its wings, sparking a hurricane on the other side of the world. Each decision we make impacts our lives in some way, whether or not we ever realize it. In my case, it wasn’t a butterfly, but a dragonfly that might have altered my destiny.
This realization came to me during my recent business trip to Washington, DC. I hadn’t been to DC since I was eleven years old, on a school field trip, so I was really excited to go back. But as much as I was looking forward to seeing our nation’s Capitol, I knew I wasn’t looking forward to the flight. I just do not particularly enjoy traveling. I love visiting new places, meeting new people, experiencing new… experiences, but I just don’t like the process of getting there. This is partly because whenever I get on a plane, at least once during the trip, I think of dying.
It’s not that I’m afraid to fly – I’m really not – but at the first rumble of turbulence or chorus of synchronized crying babies, I find my mind flashing to the image of an engine falling off, and the plane plummeting into some body of water. (There is always water, probably because I do have a fear of drowning.) Perhaps it’s the melodrama of it all, maybe it’s just to fill the mental void, but these are the pictures that run through my mind at some point during every flight.
So even more than usual, whenever I change travel plans at the last minute, I feel particularly vulnerable to tragedy. I can’t really explain why, but I often see my life in headlines, and these eleventh hour changes make me think even more about dying:
Woman takes earlier flight, hit by bus on way to airport.
Traveler gleeful until realizing she boarded faulty plane.
So Tuesday, when I got out of my conference ahead of schedule, my boss and I decided to head to the airport immediately to see if we could get on the earlier flight. Ours was scheduled to depart at 8:00pm, but there was a 5:38pm flight that we could easily make, provided there were still seats available.
We are re-booked on the earlier flight without a problem, quickly buzz through security, and have enough time left over to grab bagel sandwiches at the deli by our gate. This should have been my first clue that something wicked was about to come my way.
After boarding the plane on time, we sit at the gate for about 45 minutes without explanation, and then begin taxiing down the runway for a bit. Suddenly, the pilot comes on with some disconcerting news:
Uh, folks, this is your Captain speaking. We were about to take off for Chicago when a light that shouldn’t be on came on.
[uncomfortable pause]
But now that light has gone off again, so we’re going to head back toward the runway and get you all to Chicago.
Apparently, the pilot shares my philosophy about warning lights and mysterious body aches – if they last less than a week, disregard them entirely. However, while this strategy works fine for the “Door Ajar” light on my Honda Civic, I’m not so sure I want someone applying the same logic to a Boeing 757.
About five minutes later, the Captain comes on again.
Uh, folks, the light has come back on again, so we’re gonna have to head back to the gate and have the mechanics check this out. Then we’ll be on our way to Chicago as soon as possible.
As we sit on the plane waiting for the mechanics to check things out, the air conditioning shuts off. Although I left my travel thermometer at home, I am quite certain that the cabin temperature is rapidly approaching 85˚. As uncomfortable passengers grumble to one another and fan themselves with the emergency landing instruction cards, I think about the shorts and tank tops sitting neatly folded in my checked luggage. We sit at the gate for another 45 minutes while the mechanics inspect what turns out to be a problem with the hydraulic fluid gauge. A voice comes on again:
Uh, folks, this is your Captain speaking. The mechanical crew has fixed the light problem, however, now we need to refuel after sitting here. So it’ll be just another few minutes and we’ll be on our way to Chicago.
As I sit there, listening to people hopping on their cell phones and calling loved ones to tell them of our delay, I see the headlines again:
Woman ecstatic at making earlier flight, dies in fiery plane crash.
The cruel, bitter irony.
I roll my eyes and smile a bit as I look at the man sitting next to me. He is quiet, bald, thin, mid fifties. I hear him speak to the flight attendant, who has kept herself quite hidden during these first few hours of what was to be a 90 minute flight, and I detect that he has an Irish accent.
He takes out his cell phone and calls a woman named Sheila. Instead of complaining to her about our delay and the oppressive heat, his voice becomes soft and sweet, and he asks her what she had for lunch.
“Eat well to be well,” he says with genuine affection, and I gather that Sheila is ill.
The Irishman says goodbye, and resumes reading the enormous book he brought with him. As he reaches for the book, I notice a jagged scar stretched across the back of his left hand and wonder how he got it.
I think, so this is it? This is my destiny? I will die next to a gentle Irishman who is quietly reading The Short History of Nearly Everything. I suppose there are much worse fates, but somehow I had imagined there would be more fanfare. Will I at least clutch his hand when the plane starts to go down? Will he offer me a tender kiss? Will he tell me about Sheila before we plummet to the ground?
I think we will do none of these things. I think that in those final moments, we will sit politely next to each other, perhaps share a knowing and sympathetic glance, and I will turn toward the window to wipe away a stray tear or two. I don’t want to make a scene.
After taxiing once again toward the runway and waiting in line for another 30 minutes, the plane suddenly pulls to the side and we hear:
Uh, folks, this is your Captain speaking. We are all fueled up and ready to head to Chicago, however, we have just been informed that due to weather in Chicago, no flights are being allowed in. We’ll have to sit here and wait a bit until we get clearance.
The frustration is palpable. I accidentally let slip the “f” word while futilely adjusting the air vent for the tenth time, hoping perhaps that I had turned it the wrong way the previous nine times. I feel sweat begin to trickle down my chest, and wish that I had made time to change into a T-shirt and comfortable pants instead of eating that bagel.
A heavyset woman in the aisle next to me presses the call button for the flight attendant. Her eyes are half-closed and she is feebly fanning herself. I hear her tell the blond flight attendant with the southern accent that she has multiple sclerosis, and is unable to walk to get to the bathroom. She is feeling faint from the heat.
The flight attendant tucks a piece of hair behind her ear, leans in a bit closer to the woman and says, “You can’t walk at all?”
“No. I have MS. I need a wheelchair.”
“Okay. Okay. Let me… I’m going to talk to the pilot. I don’t have a wheelchair on board, so I think we’ll have to bring you back to the gate. You’re not gonna pass out on me, are you, ma’am?”
The flight attendant brings her a cup of ice chips and some cold towels to put on her neck and forehead. A man behind me is a paramedic, and stands up to get his stethoscope and blood pressure cuff from the overhead bin. He attempts to take the woman’s blood pressure, when the flight attendant returns and starts arguing with him.
“Sir, I’m going to need you to stop that! I need to see some sort of identification or something! I can’t just have random people working on passengers!”
I shake my head, turn toward the Irishman and say, “What’s the big deal? He’s just trying to take her blood pressure. It’s not like he’s giving her an emergency tracheotomy.”
He laughs a little, nods, then turns back to his book.
The pilot comes on one more time:
Uh, folks, this is the Captain again. We’re going to have to return back to the gate. We’ve got a medical emergency on board, and we still don’t have clearance to leave for Chicago due to the weather.
A collective groan washes over the plane, and I feel uncomfortable for the woman with MS. She just wants to go to the bathroom.
I look toward the gate, and can see the blue silhouettes of people inside the airport, running to and from their flights. The pilot tells us that we can deplane now if we want to make other travel arrangements. He can offer us no idea of when this Chicago flight might actually leave.
I look outside and see a dragonfly buzz by and softly bump into the window of the plane. It seems so out of place here. For a moment, I imagine it is a bird, which is sucked into the engine, causing us to wait another hour while the mechanical crew hoses off feathers and beak.
The dragonfly flits past my window again, and I think of William Shatner in the classic Twilight Zone episode. I see that dragonfly staring at me with iridescent eyes and smiling with dragonfly fangs as he tears out the left engine with his strong dragonfly legs.
I look over at the Irishman and think, No one will believe me.
The dragonfly comes back a third time and hovers near my window, and this time, I wonder if perhaps I misinterpreted his intentions. In his persistence, I think that maybe he is not trying to torment me, but rather to warn me.
Get off the plane.
Get off now.
I think hard about the choice the pilot has presented me. I can deplane now if I want to. I have been given the opportunity to alter history, to reverse an earlier decision. But which decision is the right one? What if I get off, rebook to the flight I was originally on, and that turns out to be the doomed one? Will the headline read:
Woman killed by own indecisiveness.
I think about why I am here, on this flight. I think about all the decisions we make during the course of a day that impact our lives in ways we cannot predict. What factors led me to seat 8A on American Airlines Flight 2353? Who will I blame when I hear the metallic scraping of the engine falling off?
1. I wanted to get home early, so I switched to the 5:38pm flight.
2. I requested a United Airlines flight, but was told by our corporate travel department that my company uses American.
3. I chose this trade show as one we should exhibit at.
4. I turned down another job offer to work for this company.
5. I quit my previous job because it was insufferable.
6. I decided to move to Chicago.
7. I was an accounting major in college, but later switched to marketing.
8. I was captain of the crossing guard in elementary school, earning me a trip to Washington, DC.
9. I was supposed to be named Lydia, but in the groggy haze of childbirth, and at the incessant hounding of the nun/nurses, my mother blurted out, “Jennifer.”
Lydia.
I have to wonder, would Lydia be on this plane right now? Would Lydia work in marketing? Might Lydia already live in DC?
Lydia would not be me, nor I her. She would not be sitting in seat 8A on Flight 2353 next to a calm Irishman reading an interesting book. She would be anywhere but here. She would not be flipping through Us Weekly, nor rationing her White Cheddar Cheez-Its. Lydia would not be wearing too-tight khakis and wishing she could unbutton them.
Lydia would have known better.
So perhaps that is it. That is the decision that made all the difference. It wasn’t some butterfly flapping its wings. It wasn’t an urgent desire to sleep in my own bed. It wasn’t a faulty hydraulic gauge.
It was nuns that killed me.
I think about that dragonfly, and imagine he has flown far away by now. Or maybe he’s still hovering around this plane, urging me to get off. I can’t tell – after five hours on this plane, it’s too dark now to see.
I listen to everyone calling friends and family who will certainly be wondering when they will arrive home. I live alone, I took a cab to the airport, and my cats cannot tell time. No one will know that I got home late.
I call my answering machine at home and listen to a message from a friend from high school. She is stuck in traffic. She wants to do lunch yesterday.
I dial my voicemail and listen again to the old messages I haven’t deleted from my cell phone.
• He is eating French fries while leaving me a message.
• She asks if I am still going to karaoke.
• They invite me to gamble at the riverboats.
• She informs me that I am due for a dental checkup.
Fries. Karaoke. Gambling. Gingivitis.
This is what I will remember. These will be my final thoughts, as I clutch the scarred hand of an Irishman whose name I don’t know, wishing I had listened to the dragonfly.

Filed under: General on July 18th, 2005