A Different Perspective

Traveling as much as I do it's a bit easy to get jaded, spent, blase' or weary on how others view travel. Often I feel like Ron White talking about "Flying With Engine Problems", NSFW but funny as hell.

  

That being said this afternoons flight provided me with a different perspective. 

I boarded, grabbed a window seat, dropped the shade and slammed the Skullcandys into my ears and then prayed to the airline Gods that no one would sit next to me. Moments later a couple right out of the summer J.Crew catalog appeared. "Are these seats taken?", I replied "No", thank you Southwest Airlines for your cattle-car boarding. The J.Crew couple, appearing exhausted, released their bodies into the adjoining seats. Thinking to myself.... "You're early 30's, it's 3:00PM and you have no kids with your, why the hell are you tired?.... and the "Lobster Shorts" your husband is wearing are stupid".

15 minutes into the flight the J.Crew wife taps me on the shoulder and asks "Do you mind opening the window shade, I'm not a very good flyer". Pulling the Skullcandys out of my ear I say "Huh", she repeats herself and I mumble something resembling "Yeah, no problem" as I knew I would be staring at the glare on my iPad for the remainder of the flight.
Fast forward another 30 minutes or so and I suddenly start hearing ambient noise under the Skullcandys, it gets louder and louder, then several SouthWest flight attendants hustle down the aisle. Moments after that the loudspeaker crackles with "Due to a medical emergency beverage service is being discontinued", damn so close to that micro-sized bag of pretzels and a cup of soda.
The flight continued without issue, and then as we were landing the loudspeaker crackled again, asking us to remain seated as Paramedics would be boarding to assist with the medical emergency.  

A team of NOLA's finest came aboard and assisted this woman, who was apparently overtaken by a panic attack, off of the plane. As she passed my row I saw true fear, I saw someone so out of their element that they struggled. I also saw travel, from a different perspective.

** The crew of flight #3389, they had their act together, no one flinched, no one panicked, and we all arrived safely.