Stone Reyes
Kyle Hays
Engl 1113-071
September 9,2014
Oblivious to Reality
The All-American family with children dressed to impress, yet wired from the sugary jelly filled donuts they just inhaled in the security line, board the 1597 American Airlines nonstop flight to Orlando, Florida. I see two boys, an age of 6 and 11, immediately take their seats in row 21, and, with no consideration to their luggage is still all out in the middle of the aisle. Their eyes still glued on their gleaming white IPad and smartphone. As soon as the other passengers boarded the plane, most acting in different, selfish, uncaring ways, the flight attendants presumed to start their routine of notifying the passengers of the safety and important details they should know while the flight is in air. While listening to my headphones I see a single mom, trying to gather enough money to send her boy to college in the fall by working extra hours and spending less time with him. Speaking to the passengers with a gleaming white smile on her face and presumes to see that most of the passengers are either too busy on their smartphones to listen to her and the important information she is preaching to them or think they are “too good” or have “heard that before” to give her the time of day. For the reason of that, all of these selfish, too good, passengers only have the image of another boring, time consuming flight to them, not thinking about the time, work, and stress that goes into the simple flight to Orlando, Florida. Which is something that I have thought of a lot and contemplated about, was the shear fact that how everyone has their own problems and no one knows when something is going to happen, whether it be a raise in their job, or a death in a family. As a society we look at people like they don’t have a purpose, little do we know that, that without that flight attendant we wouldn’t make it to our destination. It’s what goes on behind closed doors, which make the big picture happen.
“The most obvious important realities are often the ones that are hardest to see and talk about” (Wallace 1). Those tiny, sometimes annoying details in life are what humanity is being oblivious too; The tray table that the 11 year old boy is yanking to get down because its sticky from the last little kid that was in that seat, or the business man who doesn’t realize that his luggage is snagging the side of a seat while he, very aggressively, drags it down the walkway to his seat. All these little, important things us as a society take for granted are overlooked at enough and really appreciated for the time and work someone else has to put into it. “Mommy why are all those men and women under the plane and throwing bags underneath it?” This question always follows with the classic answer of “they’re putting our bags under the plane so we have clothes for the vacation sweetheart.” 99% of the time, that answer is correct, but very vague. The middle-aged man I see from the airplane window with sweat and grease all over him who just got off after his 14 hour shift may be returning to his one story house, close to being foreclosed. However to the kid, and everyone else who sees him including myself, he is just a worker putting the bags under the plane. In addition to the man fighting to keep his house and the woman struggling to send her son to college, thousands of other workers in airports portray the image to the millions of faces they see daily come through their security lines and flights as happy, well suited workers. Nevertheless, our society is so oblivious to the time and effort put into a luxury. It’s a privilege, not a right, to take an airplane from one location to another. Thousands upon thousands of men and women sacrifice their lives to please the clients of their wants and needs daily. Some of these workers spend “thousands of flight hours” testing these airplanes your family gets to ride on to exotic destinations (Discovery Channel). All in all, it