Airport philosophy

Airline travel makes me philosophical. While waiting for a recent flight, I found myself analyzing the shoes people choose to wear on planes. Business travelers often sport shiny oxfords. Practical travelers might wear tennis shoes for comfort, or whatever their largest shoe happens to be – boots, for example – to save room in their suitcase. On the other hand, some practical travelers choose simple shoes that are easy to slip on and off in the security line. Others wear flat flip flops (going to Hawaii or some other warm clime, I imagine), or tottery high heels that click away ahead of their rollie bags.

Just looking at people’s shoes gets me thinking: what happened in that woman’s day that made her choose to wear that particular pair? What was he thinking about as he tied those laces? What does footwear say about personality, values, hopes and dreams, the way people picture themselves?

This is how I get when I fly on planes: philosophical.

Yesterday I flew from Louisville to Atlanta to catch a flight back to San Jose. I had a close connection in Atlanta, but not an impossible one. So when I arrived in the A concourse, I looked at the monitors. My San Jose flight was departing from E9. Arg, that meant a train trip to the other end of the airport, four concourses away. I hurried to the train and hopped on, checking those monitors again to make sure I had the gate right. Yup, E9. Boarding.

By the time the train arrived at the E concourse, I was feeling slightly anxious. I had hoped to have a moment to visit the restroom and maybe buy a sandwich. So I bypassed the moving escalator (which was packed with people) and quickly walked up a stopped one – 60 stairs – carrying my little rolling bag. I was out of breath at the top but hurried on, checking the monitors one more time as I rushed by. E9. Boarding.

To my surprise and mild panic, when I got to E9 the monitor at the gate said not San Jose but Santiago. Santiago? And people were deplaning, not boarding. Ack! A rush back to the flight monitors. San Jose. Boarding. B29. B29? How had I made that mistake? I had checked three different monitors! No time for speculation: time to run! Back down the 60-step escalator to the train, and back through all the concourses to B. Then running up the 60-step escalator in the B-concourse (carrying the same rolling bag) and sprinting down the hallway to B29.

The gate was empty. The door was closed. Oh, no. I’ve missed it. I rushed up to the desk, gasping for breath, sweating profusely and holding a stitch in my side.

But I hadn’t missed it. They hadn’t boarded the plane yet – because of the gate change from E9. They were still waiting for the people to arrive from E9, and I was now the first one there. I hadn't misread the monitor. The gate had changed just as I arrived. Whew.

That should have been the end of the story, but it wasn’t.

After the passengers arrived from E9 and we had boarded the plane, we heard an announcement from the cockpit: we were going to have to change planes because there was a mechanical difficulty with the one we had boarded. I then discovered that for all the passengers except me, this was to be the second plane change. The people I’d seen coming off the plane at E9 were these same passengers. Unbelievably, that plane, too, had had mechanical problems that - after everyone had boarded - were not able to be resolved.

The pilot sounded pretty embarrassed.

So we deplaned, most for the second time, and were told we would depart from the gate next door: B27. We planted ourselves there and made ready for the plane we were assured was on its way from the maintenance garage.

A plane may have been on the way from the garage, but it didn’t go to B29. It went to C30. And after some delay, that’s where we were instructed to go. Back down to the train and up again in the C concourse.

By this point, the San Jose passengers were becoming pretty friendly with each other. Our common plight had led to all kinds of casual conversation among us: jokes about airlines and planes, storytelling about other travel snafus, and raised eyebrows, rolled eyes and knowing looks as each new announcement came. Anger and frustration had, for the most part, given way to laughter at the absurdity of the situation. At one point, the monitors actually said our plane had departed. Even the pilots and flight crew joined us in our predicament – chatting with us as we waited, carting their own luggage up and down escalators with us, and shaking their heads in disbelief.

As we loaded what would be our last plane, the mood was positively cordial. Everyone was chatting as if they were old friends. They helped each other load luggage and get settled. All the normal boundaries between strangers, and the distinctions between staff and passengers, seemed to have been dissolved by our camaraderie born of a communal experience.

That’s when my philosophical side really kicked in.

If a twice-delayed flight can do that for a group of strangers, I wondered, why is the fact that we’re all on this spinning ball of rock in the middle of a vast universe in which we are alone and vulnerable and at risk of poisoning our home to the point of destroying ourselves – why isn't that enough to build camaraderie born of communal experience, at least camaraderie enough to keep us from killing each other?