You know the moment.
Bleary-eyed from a long air trip, you slouch at the baggage carousel with your fellow passengers sharing a single unspoken question: Did my luggage make it?
A bell sounds. Machinery somewhere... read more
Airplane travel, I realize, is all about tension and release.
It begins even before you leave the house. You pack your bags and agonize over what to bring, what not to bring, will this... read more
Looking at the bustling bodies in an airport or the rows of seated passengers in a plane, it would seem that air travel is about people. People take business trips, visit their families,... read more
Even if I didn't have my nacrolepsy under control by that point, I thought I knew what I was doing—I thought I could manage the flight and two plane changes. It was 1979,... read more
I think of myself as a short-term pessimist and long-term optimist. I try to take the long view and think positively about people and the world. Lately it’s fashionable to talk about America’s... read more
My foreign study experience as a college student was in 1985. I spent six months in Brussels, arriving in January.
Brussels in January—and February, and March—is a gray, damp, chilled place. By the time... read more
Twenty minutes into the flight and the plane’s ceiling tore open. Misty air fogged into the cabin.
It had been a three-hour wait in the Miami airport for the connecting flight to the Dominican... read more
My father has a hot pink suitcase. When I don’t fly with him, I think about it. I think about it during descent. Maybe it’s the cabin pressure, the gum chewing, sad babies... read more
As we roll along on the granite floors of the concourse on our way to Gate 44, I feel a bit hypocritical about the handsome matching luggage my husband and I just bought. ... read more
I did, but I don’t anymore.
On a non-stop US Airways flight from JFK to Phoenix, one of my suitcases went missing. Although I’ve been flying for more than 50 years, such a traumatic... read more
