10 hours 53 minutes and counting

The right engine's on fire!  The left engine's on fire!  The plane is losing altitude - faster and faster, hurtling towards the ocean.  "Prepare for a crash landing!" the pilot yells over the intercom.

Sitting calmly in my aisle seat 34, 000 feet above the Atlantic, I take a deep breath and say to myself, "Now, there's a serious problem."

Allowing my imagination to run wild for 10 seconds, I catch it before it has a chance to get totally out of control, and drag it back to reality. No flaming engines, no frenzied voice, other than perhaps my own, searching for a way to put minor irritations into perspective.  On my way back to Arkansas, I'm into hour five of the 10 hour and 53 minute flight from Moscow to Atlanta. . . and I need an attitude adjustment.

The beverage carts have squeezed up and down the economy aisles a couple of times, the pasta or chicken dinners have been passed out, two of the four movies have aired, and people are beginning to get restless.  The lines to the toilets in the midsection seem particularly long, about 7-8 people deep on both sides of the center aisle, but I decide to stretch my legs and wait it out.  Fifteen minutes later, I discover the reason for the slow-down, a yellow rectangular sign hanging from the knob of toilet #2 stating, quite matter-of-factly, "defective."  Defective?  You mean for the next 5 hours and 53 minutes, all these people in all these fully booked seats, have to share 3 tiny toilets?  Is there no plumber on board?  I take my turn, then stop drinking for the rest of the flight.

Adding to the toilet traffic are the drinkers in the back. A frazzled flight attendant, with fading make-up and strands of hair escaping from her once perfect bun, confides to me, "Several men are having an issue with their alcohol."  By their alcohol, I wonder if she means that  they are consuming duty free purchases, the ones I saw 4 or 5 of them toting on board in the clear, plastic, suppose-to-stay sealed packages.  By the boisterous laughter and unfettered voices that bellow from row 40ish to where I sit in row 25, it's obvious they're taking the pilot's advice seriously to "sit back, relax and enjoy" their flights.

Popping up out of their seats, three children a couple of rows ahead of me decide that it's "Exercise Time!"  Running up and down the aisles, waving their arms and screaming is great fun.  The leader, a  boy who looks to be around eight years old, turns to face the crowd and blasts out a song, then another, then another.  Perhaps he's taking requests. The noise awakens the peacefully sleeping baby in the center bulkhead row, who harmonizes, with gusto.

Minor irritations. Minor irritations. Minor irritations.

I picked up the mantra several years ago when I heard Michael J. Fox interviewed on one of the late night talk shows.  The host asked if he were afraid of being typecast in the Alex P. Keaton/Mike Flaherty kind of  character he portrayed in the t.v. series, "Family Ties" and "Spin City."  Fox replied something to the effect that every day thousands of people around the world starve to death, die of treatable diseases, and are killed as innocent bystanders of war.  The possibility of being type-cast? "A minor irritation," he said. Today he has Parkinson's Disease.

But still, even minor irritations can be so IRR-I-TA-TING! Like the lady sitting behind me whose swifts kicks to the back of my seat feel like a massage chair who's out to get me.

Deep breaths. Think of 5 things you're grateful for.  More deep breaths.  Now pop those earphones in, turn the volume to high and watch "Crazy Heart," for the third time.

Minor irritations.  Thanks for the reminder, Michael.