I Can't Stand To Fly

I'm not a very good flier (Rob and his finger nail imprinted arm says, "No shit.") I know it's one of the safest forms of travel, thousands of folks around the world do it daily, safely, the plane is equipped to handle just about everything... whatever. It freaks me out.

I never was scared to fly before. Whenever I got on a plane, it never even occurred to me to be frightened of crashing. I just got on and slept or chatted with folks, no prob. I even once flew across the Atlantic Ocean on a sleeping pill, blissfully sound asleep. This trip, however, was pretty brutal on my nerves.

The two flights there were ok in terms of being nice, clear nights, with no incidents at all, but I was majorly scared because of the novelty, not having flown since 9/11, heightened security and all that.

However, from California to Houston we hit major turbulence through dark, angry storm clouds, and from Houston to New York, the plane was rocking pretty badly. That, and flying over New York makes me nervous. I spent the last half hour of the last flight with tears pouring down my face, and Rob's nerves were frayed from dealing with me. I was terrified, and when we finally got to the car, I broke down for a good solid 10 minutes. I never want to fly again, as irrational as that sounds. I told Rob the only way I'd ever get on a plane again is if one of the kids (our kids) called and was stuck in a situation they needed me for.

I think I'll have to get over it, though, because in the next year, I'm slated to go on a minimum of two trips requiring flying. The first is to Disney World this January (woohoo!) and the second is our honeymoon, which we haven't decided on yet. Right now it looks like Buenas Aries, Argentina (the dollar is really strong there, and it's beautiful).

I don't want to let my fear ground me (pun!), but it's been tough to phych myself up for getting in the air. The next time I have to go somewhere, I think I'll need a prescription for Valium.