No Talking Please, I'm FlyingPerhaps it's because it was Thanksgiving morning and everyone was hopped up on the promise of pecan pie, but on a recent flight from San Francisco to London---and that's a pretty long flight---people would not stop talking to me. And apparently I'm not the only one.
It started with my seatmate on the San Francisco to Dallas leg, who chatted away blithely even as I held my magazine on my lap, its juicy stories looking up at me teasingly while I politely endured another tale about my fellow passenger's swimming pool. Then I was subjected to a tirade on the U.S. involvement in Iraq in the waiting lounge at the Dallas Fort Worth Airport, all because I'd happened to smile at the man who sat down next to me. Finally, my seatmate on the Dallas to London part of the flight---you know, the NINE HOUR part---wanted to engage me in constant conversation about every subject under the sun. Did it matter if I was reading? If I was watching the movie? If I was listening to my iPod? It did not. He probably talked to me while I was asleep, although I wouldn't know because I strapped the eyeshade on and fell into a deep slumber just to escape his incessant chattering.
What do you do when your seatmate just won't shut up? Common advice is to bury yourself in a book, extricate yourself with a very subtle "boy, it's been a long day, I think I'll have a snooze," or even try the more direct approach of "would you like this magazine? I'm finished with it, and it's a great read."
None of these, of course, worked for me. And I'm realizing now that what I should have done is nipped the chatting in the bud right from the outset. Giving a real conversation-stopper of an answer---"I'm a mortician," for example, to the question "what do you do?"---is certainly one way to go about it. Perhaps outrageous lies don't count when you're 30,000 feet up in the air. Especially if they're only told in the name of a little peace and quiet.
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Comments
I love my Bose Noise-Cancelling headphones more for their giant, cover-my-entire-ear-so-no-I-can't-hear-you-talking usefulness than for their noise-cancelling qualities. But I think the key (and this makes me sound terrible) is to make a concerted effort not to be smiley or friendly until you've confirmed that your seatmate is not a talker. If someone does start talking to me when I have my headphones on, I don't hide my annoyance as I take them off and say, "I'm sorry, what?" Sometimes it's the only thing that works.
Frankly, I'd rather TSA screened for these people instead of making me take off my shoes in the security line.
The danger of telling someone that you're in some weird fictitious profession is that they might turn out to be in the same profession. I read about a frequent traveler who used to say tersely, "I'm in pipe. From Akron," whenever he was asked what he did, and eventually found himself in an hours-long conversation pretending to care about things like steam fittings because his seatmate actually did sell pipe for a living.
Tell me about it! On my last long flight (LA-Brisbane), I ended up sitting next to a lady that not only told me her life story, but she also tried to get me to read her self-published autobiography while on the plane! While I watched 300, she poked me literally every 5 minutes to tell me something else, always followed by "Oh, were you watching a movie? I'm so sorry." No, of course I wasn't. I was just staring at the screen wondering why my seatmate was so quiet!
I'm normally not a chatty Cathy but one time my sister and I were flying I was reading this HILARIOUS book and I kept wanting to tell her all the good parts.
She went to sleep but I still kept laughing, hoping she'd wake up.
Finally, without opening her eyes she said, "Stop laughing like that. I don't care what's so funny."
That only made me laugh harder.
Great post, Holly!
I usually fall asleep on plane rides, but if someone were persistent on a plane, I think I'd push courtesy aside and either ignore them blatantly (as in, not respond when they tap you on the shoulder) or feign sleep if I wasn't already passed out.
Stomps, what a nightmare of a story. People can't take a hint!
Had I known you'd be in Dallas (even if only for a layover), I would have met you at the airport and taken you out for a drink!
I normally hate talking to strangers on planes (or on any form of transportation), but the thing I found so great about stomps' comment is that the one time I DID enjoy someone's chatty company was when a seatmate also had me reading her autobiography! It was on a train from New York to Boston, and I'm shocked I agreed to talk to anyone in the first place--but as soon as I got to Boston, I was in a bookstore buying her book. And it was good!
Tell them you're a registered sex offender. You'll probably wind up with the entire row to yourself.
Although I hate talking on planes, I ended up in a conversation with the man next to me on a flight leaving DC over Thanksgiving and decided that I wasn't going to fall asleep so I might as well continue talking to him. As it turns out, he's a top level advisor at the White House and now next week I'm going to get to sit in on a (probably mundane) afternoon meeting at the White House. So as bad as it can get, sometimes its worth it!