Middle Seat

It’s always a lovely experience to be stuck in that middle seat on a flight, isn’t it. I already started feeling blessed with good fortunes when I heard the young woman in the window seat to my left breathing through her mouth with an occasional sniff indicating that her nose was completely stuffed… and I thought, great, getting sick is really what I wanted right now. 

The main attraction around me was a big family of six: mother, father, two kids, grandpa and grandma. The story started out with their seating arrangements — they all sat down in a cluster of two rows until a father with his young son came up to assert that two of those seats were theirs. While the mother explained to her husband which seats actually belonged to them, he and the grandfather got up to stand in the aisle. After taking the time for a stunned pause at the realization that they will be separated, they go through several options how the family could be dispersed, all the while holding up the entire boarding process as no-one was getting past them. But Canadians are the most patient people in line-ups and the least confrontational that I have ever encountered — no arguments or fights broke out and everyone stayed calm and composed as the flight got more and more delayed. 

Finally, the seating arrangements were decided and the father-and-son duo was allowed to settle into their seats. On my right now sat the daughter of the family, across the aisle the grandfather, and the mother and her young son were a row ahead with a middle-aged Mexican woman. 

While the boarding continued, the mother started engaging with the Mexican lady beside her, who didn’t seem to understand a lot judging by the way the mother was speaking slowly and deliberately and repeating herself, like one does when talking with foreigners, and in her quest to be understood she spoke loudly enough for the nearest ten or twelve rows to learn as much about her family as she wanted them to know — for example that she had three children and the oldest daughter was nineteen and not on vacation with them, and that the boy on her right was her ten-year-old son, and then she pointed backward to introduce her 14-year-old daughter sitting beside me upon which the Mexican lady turned around, all smiles, nodded and said, muy hermosa (very beautiful), and then she looked at me, maybe wondering how I fit in with my blond hair, blue eyes and fare complexion contrasted against the tall, thin and lanky daughter with olive skin and long black hair. 

After the boarding was completed, finally, and the safety instructions were given, the lights were dimmed and the mother could continue her monologue showing her seat neighbour family photos and telling her that this was the first time since her nineteen year old daughter was born that she went on vacation — the first time and she is nineteen! — and that they all lived in Vancouver and that many flights were cancelled in the last few days because of an unusual amount of snow, and then she started talking about her mami and papi… and I eventually succeeded in my attempts to fade her out by focusing on my book. 

Not much later, I noticed that the daughter was bent over, her torso lying on her legs, and I wondered for a moment if she was alright, but then I saw that the mother, finally quiet, was in the same position and they were just trying to sleep — successfully, I found out, as the daughter gradually started to lean against my leg. 

The young lady on my left was also sleepy, nodding into my direction, body wobbling, interrupted by jerky moves back into the upright position, making me think she would end up leaning against me, too, but then she settled into a position leaning against the plane’s wall. The grandfather across the aisle had fallen into a slumber and was snoring loudly. I folded my table down and leaned by e-book reader against the seat in front for comfortable reading, and then I felt the daughter trying to put her head onto my leg underneath the table… I gently lifted my leg up; now there was no room for her head between my leg and the table. Half dazed, she rose out of her position and tried to sleep sitting up, her uncontrolled swaying revealed her half-asleep state, and eventually she touched my arm with her right hand, almost like a reference point solidifying her position in space, and I allowed it. When she put her right foot onto my leg, I thought, well, that’s better than the head, and as if encouraged by my leniency, she let her left leg slip from her seat toward me until I end up with her right foot on my knee and her left knee in my ribs. 

As she settled into a sleep, I felt reminded of a train ride in Germany: my young self went to a job interview half across the country, a four-hour train ride away; I’d had gotten up early for the trip, and on the way back I was so tired that I couldn’t help falling asleep, much like the young girl beside me. When I woke up I was surrounded (in two benches facing each other) by three fellow travellers not much older than me, my body positioned awkwardly slid down half off the seat and almost falling to the ground, which is likely what woke me up, and I saw the three faces around me smirking like they had just been making fun of me and my sleepy moves. Remembering this story made me feel tender toward the kid imposing on me; I knew what it was like to be so tired that nothing else matters, and so I let her be with no hard feelings.

After two hours of flight my back hurt and I felt a natural urge for the restroom. I felt bad to wake up a child and hoped that she would wake up by herself, but eventually, I sat up straight to relieve my back a little, and she started stirring. When she turned around and wobbled a little, I took my opportunity to ask her if she could let me out, so I could go to the washroom. She nodded sleepily and got up for me; I half expected her to take over my seat entirely while I was away, but no, she was awake waiting for me to return and let me back in. Blessedly, she fell asleep sitting upright this time, and I had a bit of peace, still reading my book since I had no luck myself getting any sleep. And all the while I hear the grandfather’s snores from the right side, now mixing in a duet with his neighbour’s. 

About four hours into the flight, the daughter, bent over again and started leaning against my leg; I expected the whole procedure to repeat, but after another sleepy choreography she surprised me by cuddling up and putting her head into my elbow in full sleep… leaving me wondering uncomfortably for a moment what I should do next. Saved by the bell, I felt a pressure in my ears that signified the plane’s descending; the grandfather across woke up, saw my predicament and tried to rouse his grandchild gently with pats on her back until she moved away from me, although she stayed asleep until the cabin crew came through checking on fastened seat belts, upright seats and earphones in ears prior to landing. 

My middle seat experience could have been worse than a sweet young teen cuddling up against me, but I was relieved when I got out of the plane, red-eyed in the wee hours of the next day.