Aero-Contortionism

copyright 2004 Dale Hansen - no reproduction without permission

My boss sent me to one of our other offices near Knoxville TN. His boss’s secretary made the arrangements.

That’s was how I found out she hates me.

It’s possible that it was an honest mistake (or several honest mistakes). She is less then five foot tall herself, and could comfortably ride in the glove compartment of most import cars. It’s probably hard to remember the one you are making arrangements for is almost 6’6” and by no means skinny.

In retrospect, I am prepared to say that it was an oversight, but at the time I would have sworn she was trying to kill me.

I had to change planes in Dulles airport in Washington DC. The flight there, apart from the heightened security/post 9-11 full cavity check and DNA sampling, was rather uneventful. It was a fairly nice plane, and I was able to trade my middle seat(!) for one on the isle. It was a decent, normal flight. It was the only one of the trip.

At Dulles, I climbed into a rolling waiting room. If you’ve never been to Dulles, you need to go just to see these things. These are large rooms, complete with couches and little tables – on wheels. There is a door on either side of this contraption, and the idea is to move a group of passengers from one inaccessible door to another inaccessible door on the other side of the airport.

It looks like so many single-family homes having an informal dance.

The doors on the terminals to which these monstrosities hookup are not, by the way, on the same level. In addition to going back and forth, and left to right, these vehicles also go up and down to approach a level with the next door. This is never actually achieved.

Any amusement park would charge for a ride like this one. Anything that goes up and down while rolling around on uneven pavement, rattling it’s passengers like so many marbles in a tin can has to be a premium ride.

It took me three tries to get over that final step when we docked with the building on the other side of the airport, but I survived the ride, so bought a commemorative T-shirt to mark the occasion.

I headed for the next gate, for my connecting plane. I thought once I was boarded, I could rest a little, and sooth my aching – ahm – lower back. I walked down the airport, following the signs.

I stopped dead at the gate.

The door lead outside.

I am a child of the late 20th century. I know that it was once common practice to board a plane from the outside, but it also used to be common practice to shovel horse manure off of Main Street too.

This was a new experience for me, but I was rather charmed. I thought it was a very quaint little practice, bringing a bit of the old world into such a metropolitan area..

Then I saw the plane.

The first thing that struck me was that the plane had two PROPELLERS! I’d seen propellers in museums or on the small private planes that a few suicidal, dare-devil, extreme sports loving people flew around for fun, but the charm fled when I realized that I was placing my life on these inverted ceiling fans.

Then I noticed the plane itself.

I compared the overall size of the plane with my left shoe. The shoe was a little bigger, and not nearly as old. The stairs leading up to the plane doubled as it’s door. This had the bonus result of having a trampoline effect when you climbed up them.

I decided I would rather shovel horse manure off of Main Street.

I took the first step on the ramp and the stairs bounced me the rest of the way in. The inside of the plane was about six feet from the floor to the ceiling (remember the 6’6” passenger?). Not only could I not stand up, the aisle was so narrow, I had to walk down it sideways. Neck stretched out and down, shoulders hunched down around my ankles, I crab walked down to my assigned seat, only to find that the real horror had only begun.

This was on of those little puddle-jumping commuter flights where there are two seats on one side of the plane and a row of a single seat on the other side. I had the seat on the single side. Right up against the curve of the body of the plane.

In order to sit in this seat, I had to dislocate my left shoulder, tie my left arm across my chest, lay my head down on my right shoulder, and attempt to fit the overhead light into my left ear, then lay my nostril over the stewardess call button.

I got my legs into the proper position by raising my left leg just under my chin and twisting that foot up and behind my back. The right leg was simply crushed by the armrest of the seat. There wasn’t a single thing I could do about the right foot. Half of that foot was in the aisle and that was where it was going to stay. After I got myself twisted into the seat, I realized I had forgotten about my carryon luggage.

On this plane, at least on my side, there was no “under the seat in front of you” for baggage. The only place available was under your own seat, but even then, like me, the bag didn’t fit.

I set the laptop bag down on the floor, as close to under my seat as it would go and attempted to re-twist myself into position. Dislocate the shoulder, nose on the call button, light in the ear, knee under the chin, right leg … got stuck on the laptop.

The only way to get back into position was to put my right leg on top of the laptop. Standing on a laptop didn’t seam like a very wise choice, so I compromised by suspending my leg over the bag like the sword of Damocles ready to drop the judgment of death to my carryon.

Holding my breath and closing my eyes, I kept telling myself it was only a few hours to Knoxville. As I sat there, trying not to notice all the smaller people who trying not to notice me, the stewardess (I save the word flight attendant for those I respect) came to me, smiled sweetly and said, “Sir, please fasten your seat belt.”

First of all, let me say that there was nowhere that a seatbelt would prevent me from going that my current posture wouldn’t prevent first. Secondly, my left hand was currently beneath my right check (THAT cheek!) and my knees were attempting to trade sides, just for variety. I couldn’t even find a seat belt, let alone get a grasp on it.

I tried to explain this to the young lady, but the ventilator nozzle was blowing compressed air into my open mouth and it was coming out of my sinuses. I couldn’t even nod, because every time I tried, I ended up pressing the stewardess call button.

I was able to grasp the right side of the seat belt with my left hand and the left side of the belt with my right foot. Twisting in just the right way brought the two pieces in close proximity. It was the best I could do. She came by later and strapped down like so much cargo.

I lost track of where my right hand was, and lost feeling in my left. My hips had pretty much given up all hope of ever moving again, and my glasses where having an intimate encounter with the oxygen mask.

I was wishing I could have left my stomach on the ground.

Fortunately, this was a full-service airline. The takeoff from the runway left my stomach on the ground for me.

We where finally on our way, several business men, most of us tired and wanting no more than to arrive at our destination. All but me trying not to stare at this one person train wreck that had stuffed it’s self into the corner of the plane.

I saw one guy waving at me, looking embarrassed. I wondered why when I discovered the location of my right hand. It had somehow wrapped back around and was indeed waving at him.

Actually, it was flapping lifeless in the breeze from the vent standoff that was buried in my mouth and blowing the cabin air through my nose.

I tried to stop the motion, but I had lost motor control. I couldn’t explain the situation to him either, because my tonsils now had wind burn. Biting down on the vent nozzle, I was able redirect the flow of air. I’m not sure what that did to my arm, but the man I had been waving at suddenly became deeply offended.

If my hand was doing to him what he did to me, I would like to take this opportunity to apologize.

Having situated myself into such a position that I had lost most of my circulation, I was able to relax. That is to say that I eventually lost all feeling in my extremities.

In an effort to test whether or not that I was still alive, my body reacted with the one function it still had left.

A very full bladder warning.

I flowed out of the seat like an oil spill, filling the aisle and the lap of the man across from me before I could figure out how to put my feet on the floor. The problem wasn’t finding the floor, I no longer knew where my feet were.

Remember that the inside of the plane was six inches shorter than I was? My body didn’t care. There was such relief from the forced contortions, it was going to stretch, no matter what I thought about it!

After the second time I slammed my head on the ceiling, my brain got the idea that perhaps it wouldn’t be such a bad idea to stop stretching before the gathering darkness got any deeper.

I looked to the back of the plane for the bathroom. I didn’t see one. It wasn’t like the plane was big enough to conceal a toilet. The plane was barely bigger than a toilet!

“Miss” I croaked, now that the wind tunnel was out of my throat. “Where’s the bathroom?” I didn’t dare ask if there was a bathroom.

“Right behind that door” she said with a smile that could have been a result of a recent botox treatment.

“That door” was a door which was up against the interior wall of the plane. The only possible place “that door” could have gone was out on the wing and that vegga-matic propeller.

I decided to call her bluff. I walked back to the rear of the plane and discovered the cabin of this toy plane was actually getting smaller the further back it went. I now had to bend my knees, put my head on my chest and walk sideways to get to the rear of the plane. I looked like I was walking through a trash compactor.

“That door” was on my right hand side. On the left was the sort of galley that would have been too small for a van-conversion RV. The little galley had a thin wall to separated it from the passengers.

I couldn’t open “that door” without first smashing myself against the serving cart. The cart pressed up against the cabinetry, upsetting three miniature bottles of water and a bag of peanuts. I was able to rescue the bottles by throwing my face at them, but the peanuts were on their own. I opened the door expecting an out-house on the wings, but found to my surprise a toilet. Not a bathroom - just a toilet.

“That door” opened on fixture that was molded out from the wall. A miniature sink was located just above it and –ironically, the “please resume your seat” sign was at the top of this little alcove where it would be impossible to see if you happen to be sitting down.

After a second glance, I realized that no one would be sitting down on this protrusion of wall, flip up seat or no. I began to wonder if that was why there were all men on this flight.

“That door” was meant to open all the way and latch against the thin wall of the galley. Thus the galley was now a part of the bathroom. I resolved NEVER to eat peanuts on this flight. The ones that fell where officially no longer on a kitchen floor, they were now on a bathroom floor.

I don’t know why that made such a difference, but I couldn’t eat for the rest of the day.

Now in order to use this overhang, I had to get somewhere in the vicinity of it. To do this, in the shortest section of a miniature airplane, I had to brace my knees against the wall on either side of it. My right hand was needed for aiming (sorry ladies!) and my left hand was similarly engaged in holding the seat up, as it was spring loaded to return to it’s resting position. So much for a man’s flight!

Because of the curvature of the wall of the plane, I was required to press my face against the “return to your seats” sign, ending up with the impression of the word “your” being etched into my cheek in reverse.


I looked like one of those stuffed cats in the back window of a car, suction cupped to the glass, only this cat was doing something fairly obscene.

In a kitchen.

When I finished, I attempted to use the sink. I know I washed my hands because I could feel the water, but I couldn’t see to find the soap. I found a dinner napkin to wipe my hands and tried to open “that door”.

I had to slam into the cart again, this time the water bottles were just a loss. I still took off a part of my cheek getting the door past my face, but I got it secured against the hidden toilet.

Only to find our stewardess waiting for me so she could serve the in-flight refreshment.

I crab-walked back to my seat. I could feel my knees opening up again as the floor dropped slightly beneath me. Once to my seat, I could almost stand up again. Having learned from the last time, my body did not try to straighten, but passively waited to be retied.

Once back in my seat, twisted and pulled and strapped down, having adamantly refused both peanuts and water, I waited for the end of the trip.

The landing was smooth, but the taxiing was rather reminiscent of the one time I was a passenger in a friend’s low rider.

I was the last one off of the plane because it took the stewardess and the copilot an hour to untie my limbs.

I spent the rest of the day in a hotel room moaning like an cow with an anxiety disorder. By the morning, I was able to get to the office, but I walked sideways with my knees bent and my head down for a few days.

Several of my coworkers asked me about the word “your” stenciled backwards into my right cheek.

The trip back to Dulles was on a larger plane and, while not comfortable, wasn’t the journey through munchkin land the trip out had been. Although this stewardess did attempt to enforce the “keep the aisles clear” rule by slamming my knee with the serving cart. Several times.

From Dulles back to Phoenix, however, even though it was aboard a large plane with plenty of room, my boss’s boss’s secretary had booked me a middle seat in the last row of the plane.

The two gentlemen on either side of me were of the same general height and size. That is, they both came to about the level of my shoulders. I looked like a middle finger in the back of the plane.

Never make a secretary angry, and never fly in anything smaller than what you would normally wear.