We Are More Than Occupants

I was hoping the plane seat next to me would be empty. But, as I opened my magazine, I thought how comfortable it would be to spread my things out and relax without talking to anyone.

However, the voice that made me look up told me that would not happen. The petite young girl standing before me wore brown baggy shorts too large for her and an equally baggy gray shirt with a guy’s name on it.

She had pulled her hair back in a tight ponytail, and her face looked tired. She already had headphones hanging around her neck, and a connected wire traveled to her pocket. She was carrying a poster board with drawings and names written all over it.

“Excuse me,” she said, “That’s my seat.” And she slipped into the window seat next to me. We exchanged a few words, and then I returned to my magazine, hoping she didn’t want to talk. But instead, she pulled her headphones over her ears.

It is interesting how you can sit close to someone on a plane and act like they aren’t there. We nod and greet each other and then retreat into our worlds while the person in the seat next to us becomes simply an occupant.

Sometimes when I am having a snack with my elbows only inches from the person next to me or taking a nap with our heads nodding in the same direction, I think about how odd it feels.

The young girl was resting. She had laid her head on the tray in front of her and was dozing. So it didn’t look like we would have much in common.

Just when I was about to retreat into my magazine, something happened to the plane. Without warning, it felt as though the massive machine had hit a couple of big potholes in the sky and then dropped about 1,000 feet.

My arm reached for the young girl sitting next to me without hesitation. She awoke abruptly and looked around with the same fear and confusion I felt on her face.

Some passengers gasped, and others laughed nervously, and for a moment, I couldn’t focus because it felt like the plane was out of control. Thankfully, after a few uncertain minutes, the pilot evened the plane, and the ride became smooth again. When I looked at the girl, she smiled and said, “Thanks, that’s what my mom would have done.” We both laughed.

The flight attendant announced that there had been some turbulence and everything was fine. However, the girl in the seat next to me was no longer an occupant. Her name was Liz. She was a sophomore at the University of Michigan and majoring in psychology.

She just finished two missionary trips with the Way of the Cross Ministries inTexas. “I’ve been doing this for four years,” she said. She told me about the services she and the ministries have in Mexico, the children they teach, and the houses they have helped build.

While she was talking, her face’s tiredness went away, and excitement came alive in her eyes. The poster she had brought on the plane as a souvenir of the good wishes and friendship signatures she had collected. “I love going on missionary trips,” she told me, “It is working for more than a paycheck.”

The rest of the trip to my daughter’s home was a little different. I put away my magazine for a while and paid attention to the people around me. One 86-year-old woman was traveling to Frankfurt, Germany, to see her son. She appeared frail and shy when you first looked at her, but when she talked about all the places she had traveled since her husband passed away,

I saw a woman with passion and courage. The airline attendant was from Boston and had barely escaped the tragedy of 9/11 by changing her mind at the last minute about working the flight to New York.

A young couple looked at us apologetically and explained that their baby was teething when they couldn’t get her to stop crying.

Sometimes we want to be alone, even when people surround us. However, when we let people touch our lives with their stories and smiles, it helps to see them as more than occupants.