I don’t fly very often. Infrequently enough that I still pay attention to the safety demonstration given by the flight attendant. Infrequently enough that I still press my nose to the little window and marvel at the birds-eye perspective on the world. Infrequently enough that I still look forward to the arrival of the refreshment cart, yet feel vaguely disappointed by its meager offerings.
Here are some of the things I’ve noticed while flying.
- Even if it’s pouring rain on the ground, it’s sunny above the clouds. I think about this on rainy days, and it cheers me up.
- From up in the sky, you can’t see any evidence of any animals except for human beings. The evidence of us is everywhere. We’re a blight on the planet.
- A lot of people have swimming pools, especially those who live near large bodies of water.
- From a plane you can clearly see that every square inch of this planet belongs to someone. When you really think about it, it seems odd that we can “own” land. And even if we all agree to that system, with deeds and titles and so on, does anyone really own the land? Or do we all just agree to pretend we do?
Those are some of the things I think about while flying. I also think about who will I eat first if we crash in the Andes, how happy I am that I don’t smoke anymore, and whether my camera batteries are going to explode because of the changing pressure.
From up in the sky, you can’t see any evidence of any animals except for human beings. The evidence of us is everywhere. We’re a blight on the planet.
Perhaps ironically, preventing catastrophic climate change may well require making our presence even more obvious, by building gigantic solar, wind, hydroelectric, and tidal facilities.
Our most worrisome impact right now is now visible at all: the accelerating accumulation of greenhouse gases in the air.
It is amazing what you can see when you are still watcing with enthusiastic amazement. I still look out airplane windows and marvel at the beautiful patch-work patterns of farms, of how many swimming pools there are and at urban traffic.
One winter day, when flying from Sudbury, I looked behind the airplane and noticed circular rainbows following the plane. I asked the flight attendant what it was and she admitted she had never noticed. After consulting with the captain, she came back and told me that tiny ice-shards were flying off the wing and the refraction of the sun was making the rainbows. Totally amazing and beautiful and all noticed because of my enthusiasm over the novelty of flying.
“From a plane you can clearly see that every square inch of this planet belongs to someone”
I guess that depends on where you’re flying from/to because I’ve always marvelled about the exact opposite – at how much unpopulated wilderness there is in Canada…even in Ontario. There are miles and miles and miles of what’s considered Crown land which doesn’t have so much as a dirt path to navigate. If you want to go there, you need a canoe and strong shoulders and you might not get out. Even tiny Nova Scotia has such a dense a wide expanse of unchartered forest that Emergency Response types from all over North America and parts beyond use it for high-level training. I always feel good when I see or hear about all that wilderness
I love the line from Crocodile Dundee, where they are talking about aboriginal land claims and he says, “it’s like two fleas fighting over who owns the dog they live on.”
Even if you fly rarely, you can get a similar perspective from Google maps, satellite view. I am enamored of it.
I have added exploding batteries to my list of things to worry about.
Yup, I’ll be worrying about exploding batteries too; thanks so much for that thought! Must remember to pack batteries separately from yarn/knitting…..
I know of a person who takes the precaution to never have a drink while on a plane on the chance happening that she has to take over piloting in the event that the pilots are overcome with illness. The thing is: 1) she has no piloting skills per se and 2) she is a quadriplegic. No joke.
I know a girl that will not drink while flying in case she has to use the facilities. Does not want to be found with her pants down if the flight goes down.
It’d be a pisser being a vegitarian out there in the Andes, hmm?
I always think about the Andes, too. Funny thing is, I have never been to S. America and hardly ever fly (I don’t like it). I ride the train over a bridge to work every day and I think about what I will do if the train falls off the bridge. Who will get in my way as I try to kick out the windows? In my minds’ eye, I am the person who helps everyone else to safety but I’m neither strong or particularly brave so I’m not sure where that image comes from.
I used to think we were going to get off this planet before we used it all up, but nobody’s even working on that. I’d rather go live on Mars or someplace than on a blighted Earth all covered in giant windmills and solar collectors. Then we can start being a blight on Mars too.
I like this post/comments because it makes me feel better knowing im not the only one who thinks too much about things most people consider to be silly.
I have also added exploding batteries to my list of worries…:(