GRACE UNDER PRESSURE-LOSS

United Airlines spares its attendants the drudgery of repeatedly demonstrating flight safety warnings and techniques. Instead, they engage a safety video that plays on a small screen attached to the seat back in front of you.

In this video, passengers in various states of emergency (water landing, pressure loss; “we are presently out of red wine”), very calmly and happily do horrible but necessary things to save their lives.

For instance, here is a mother and daughter chatting away happily. Suddenly, two oxygen masks drop from the ceiling in front of their faces. This means, of course, that all oxygen has been sucked from the plane. No matter. Why be alarmed? In fact, the mother and daughter are apparently quite delighted for the interruption.

(In my opinion, the unruffled demeanor of the air emergency victims in this video reflects poorly upon United Airlines. How is it that passengers could meet the sudden appearance of oxygen masks with such indifference—nay, outright felicity? Apparently, the advent of life-saving apparatuses such as oxygen masks on United Airlines flights is as common as the appearance of beverage carts.

“Hello. Welcome aboard United Airlines. We are completely out of oxygen. Would you care for a Sprite?”

The mother smiles as she places the elastic band of the oxygen mask carefully around her head. The startling word here is, “carefully.” To my amazement, the woman tries hard to avoid displacing a single strand of her hair. How certain people be so self-aware in the face of such peril, is cause for wonder. I can picture myself remaining calm in such a situation, but I’m not sure I would dig out my lint-roller and de-fuzz my sports coat.

This woman’s young daughter is also delighted at the sudden pressure drop, the lack of oxygen, and the fact that her mother is obeying flight safety instructions to the letter, including putting her mask on first, before assisting her. The child is three shades of blue before the mother tends to her mask, but that’s okay. The three shades are a cute combination. These two debilitated yet happy passengers follow every airline rule, including that which prohibits tampering with or disabling lavatory smoke detectors.  

But now, the flight has a worse problem The plane has crash landed into the water! At least there is oxygen aboard, but that is small consolation when the airplane is floating somewhere between San Francisco and Honolulu.

The ever-present United Airlines camera now focuses on an extremely attractive young lady who has already located her life vest (she knows it is located beneath her seat, smart girl) and is now placing it around her neck and preparing to inflate it. Success! Like the victim before her, she has managed to accomplish this task without displacing a single strand of beautiful, shiny, voluminous, protein-rich, brunette hair. I am happy for her, and she is clearly happy for herself.

But now, a dilemma! There are two ways to inflate the life vest: either by pulling down on a red tab, or manually inflating it through a plastic blow-tube. This woman does not take chances; she has a “dual-inflator” personality, and will cover her bases. She pulls the red tag and purses her full, luscious lips, to blow additional air into her bright yellow vest.

Although it has been forty-five minutes since watching this terrifying yet entertaining video (I am still on the flight, a quarter of the way between Las Vegas and Houston), I can still see the voluptuous red kissing organs of this spectacularly good-looking air disaster victim, pursing and puckering around the plastic inflation tube. 

With two delicate, scented breaths (at least I am assuming they are scented; they are clearly delicate), she has inflated the rubber-duckie-colored life-saving device to full capacity.

Next stop: The Pacific Ocean!

I wish I could handle life’s little curve balls with the calm, graceful aplomb of these air disaster heroines. From whence comes such quiescence? Are they members of the body of Christ? Friends of the pilot? Angels in the guise of women? Professional swimmers? I can only guess. I can only pray for similar peace, in similar circumstance.

In the meantime, even though my flight is still in the air with all its oxygen, I believe I will head for the lavatory and disable the smoke detector there—just for the hell of it.

© 2012 by Martin Zender