Dear Airlines,

We’re breaking up. Like many people these days, I’ll come visit when I absolutely have to, but I feel obliged to tell you why I don’t want you in my life anymore.

I loved spending time with you, you know. You had expensive tastes, but such style! You stopped having dinner with me, but I could stand to lose a few pounds. I’ve put up with charley horses caused by your seats, and used my laptop in the flat vertical position (typing with my fingers parallel to the floor) in order to keep my mind off of the fact that you don’t care about my happiness anymore. As people stop flying, the flight times are reduced drastically, sometimes meaning it will take me longer to fly than to drive.

Dropping people off and picking people up from your business is a nightmare. Either it’s impressively clogged to hell 5 lanes deep with no hope of either reaching the curb or escape … or there are a half-dozen screaming officers berating people to keep it moving, move forward, don’t stop whatever you do. I’m not exactly sure why some dude in an explosive car would need more than 30 seconds to do the deed, but I trust that somehow it makes us all safer to keep us constantly on our toes.

Now I have to choose between a low-level radiation scan that may be significantly more dangerous than the rads we’re exposed to while flying or having you lift my testes to check for contraband, putting your fingers in my waistband, and lifting my (somewhat generous) belly. I can’t help but think that your representatives, the TSA, are doing this to punish me, because there are dozens of stories from every airport in the country about them doing just that, and even admitting as much aloud. Humiliating children and people with physical disabilities, disrespecting the personal integrity of people who have been abused …

The point I’m trying to make is not that I think you must not do these things to keep us safe. It is that you are a business selling something that is no longer, in any way, fun.

You don’t seem to train your agents for courtesy, dignity, or helpfulness, to the point that a single agent smiling at me is a welcome departure (ha).

It’s not my place to decide the efficacy of your rules or whether it is worth more to you to charge us for extra pillows and a single piece of luggage. It IS my place to say that this is no longer an experience I want to have, and until you make it worth my time and money, you will be at the very bottom of my travel options – a last resort, when you used to be a welcome luxury.

Sorry. The best thing about flying these days is that it is brief. Bring on the high speed rail.

~ by Skennedy on November 22, 2010.

8 Responses to “Dear Airlines,”

  1. I had already bought our plane tickets when TSA initiated the new “search and seizure” screening or we would not be flying to MI next month. Next time we fly we’ll make it a point to avoid airports with the new machines.

  2. I had already bought our plane tickets when TSA initiated the new “search and seizure” screening or we would not be flying to MI next month. Next time we fly we’ll make it a point to avoid airports with the new machines.

  3. “Bring on the high speed rail”

    Jeezzus, really? Why not just drive? See some of this country?

  4. “Bring on the high speed rail”

    Jeezzus, really? Why not just drive? See some of this country?

  5. I love travelling by train. It means I don’t have to drive (since I have to do that all the time, it’s become a chore instead of a pleasure) and I get to chill out and watch the scenery.

    It’s also quite comfortable; much more so than a bus.

  6. I love travelling by train. It means I don’t have to drive (since I have to do that all the time, it’s become a chore instead of a pleasure) and I get to chill out and watch the scenery.

    It’s also quite comfortable; much more so than a bus.

  7. We drove 8-9 hours each way this weekend listening to an audio book (The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms: Inheritance Trilogy, Book 1) It made the drive feel like no time at all.

  8. We drove 8-9 hours each way this weekend listening to an audio book (The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms: Inheritance Trilogy, Book 1) It made the drive feel like no time at all.

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