Lenawee Smiles: An airborne opportunity unlikely to come again

It couldn’t happen today nor would it have after Sept. 11, 2001. But it happened about 15 years prior to that horror of a day.

I boarded a flight in Detroit that would take me to Montreal. From there, the flight would head for London. We landed at Montreal where other passengers began boarding the flight.

An airline representative stopped at my seat and verified my name.

“You need to come with me. I will get your carryon luggage for you. Please follow me.”

I was alarmed: Was I being arrested?

“Why am I supposed to follow you?”

The man leaned over and whispered in my ear that my seat was needed to mollify a couple who wanted to sit together. Through some mix-up, one of them had not been booked with the other.

“Am I still going to be on this flight?”

He nodded, smiled and said, “I think you will be very pleased with this alternate seat.

I followed him as he started going up the flight of stairs to the upper deck seating. I scanned the cabin and didn’t see one empty seat. I really was puzzled but I kept following him forward. I then thought I would be riding in one of the jump seats used by the flight attendants. However, we passed those and were at the door of the cockpit.

He pushed it open and said to the captain, you will have a visitor up here. The captain looked at me, smiled and said, “Welcome aboard. Just sit there and buckle up until I tell you to unbuckle."

The seat was for an unneeded navigator I was told. Beside and above me were many buttons and lights.

I was terrified. What if I touched something and re-routed us to Madagascar?

The captain gave me instructions as to what to do if the plane landed in the Atlantic.

He showed me a small door in the ceiling and said if we hit the water, the door would be opened and I would have to climb out…. Right. I cannot swim and have a healthy respect for frigid nighttime oceans housing critters happy to eat humans.

I looked at him and said in all likelihood I would go down with this ship. Considering the number of passengers filling the plane, I had my doubts that I would be able to get on a life raft. Someone would decide I should be dumped into the brine.

I never thought I could put on a life vest and inflate it with my own huffing and puffing.

If I didn’t think I could manage that, how would I climb out of the roof?

Then the magic came: we took off and I was able to see what the pilots see on a night flight. The runway lights disappear faster and faster and you know you are up and away.

I was told I could leave my seat and sleep if I chose to. I was pointed to a door and someone said, “Just make yourself at home in there.”

“In there” was a small bedroom with bunk beds and reading lights.

Now this was really flying!

I checked it out but went back into the cockpit, again avoiding any buttons or levers that might cast us down.

We were above the clouds, and the sky was lit by the moon. It just hung there in front us like a Christmas ornament. I am not sure I’ve ever witnessed anything that was so beautiful and haunting.

I ate with the captain and co-captain then thought I would try to sleep.

No luck. I could always sleep. But I could not always fly in the cockpit of a jumbo jet.

Watching the earth rise before us as we landed was equally exciting

I knew I would never get to fly like that again. Even in the best of times.

Some years later, the worst of times would strike and such opportunities never allowed again.

Susan Keezer lives in Adrian. Send your good news to her at lenaweesmiles@gmail.com.

This article originally appeared on The Daily Telegram: Susan Keezer: An airborne opportunity unlikely to come again