A story about a man I met who taught me life lessons on a flight to Philadelphia.
The flight was packed and with no room overhead, I struggled to squeeze my large backpack in between the seats in front of me.
"I'm sorry." I said to the man beside me.
"It's just us, no worries," an old man said with a warm smile. He held a smile in his eyes the sides of his eyes turned upwards.
With a quick glance, it was apparent that he has had a hard working life. He had on a pair of light khaki cargo pants that were scuffed up and a loose white tee-shirt. His hands rough wrinkled with age and experience. Despite my best intentions, I conducted a quick assessment to judge whether this companion of mine was safe enough to converse with, if they would continue to bother me through the rest of the 4 hour flight. It had seemed that spending four years at university has made me skeptical around older adults not dressed in business casual or the stereotypical professor dress of a button down and slacks.
I took a pause suddenly decided to ask him, "How are you, how was your day?". I had realized that we pass by people on a daily basis without ever saying hello. I should at least be nice and friendly in case the plane ever goes down unexpectedly - weird how my mind works sometimes.
His smile grew large as he heard me, light shone from his eyes, "Good, good! Thank you for asking!"
He proceeded to ask me where I was going, if Philadelphia was my home. I answered that I was going back to school and that school for me was somewhere far away in cold Ithaca, that Philly was just a transfer stop.
I asked him where he was going and where he was from. His voice quiet and horse, probably weathered from too much of his youth doing the exact opposite. By this time the planes engines had started taking off. Even through my ears being muddled from the changes in pressures and elevation, I was somehow able to make out parts of his story.
The old man sitting to the right of me was originally from Portugal and is going back to visit for the first time in a long time. He had worked in construction and was a carpenter through the many years in his life. He named many buildings and addresses of all the buildings he had worked on through his time, but I was unable to catch most of it. Most of University Park, he said, he has physically touched and worked on. Fixing it, maintaining it, or building it from the ground up.
The conversations died and I proceeded to put my headphones on, falling asleep for an hour or two. When I woke, he was still sitting there in the exact same position.
Almost immediately after I woke, he turned to me and uttered some words. It was as if he had been waiting for me to wake up.
I took my headphones down, "I'm sorry?"
"What are you studying in school?" he asked.
"Business. Business concentrating in International Trade and Environmental stuff," I said. We talked about my studies for a while before I asked him what made him want to be a carpenter.
He said he wasn't sure. "Too long," he shook his head, "it was too, too, long ago."
"I don't know, I just went to trade school you know? Where they teach you all different skills. Carpentry was what I did." His way of speaking was always direct, without fluffy details.
When I asked why carpentry specifically he just shrugged and smiled, as if he was as amused as I was, "Who knows? I just wanted to make a living."
The rest of the flight followed a similar pattern. My headphones would be in and once in a while he would turn to me and utter some words. I would take my headphones off, make him repeat his question again and we would proceed to have a conversation.
At one point I turned to my head and saw the calming sunset out the window, making the clouds below shimmer with cotton candy light. I tapped on his shoulder to make sure he saw.
"Thank you," he happily said. "Without you, I would've missed it."
I asked him if there was a place where he has seen the most beautiful sunset.
"No, no." He said quickly without thought. "They are all beautiful, every single one of them."
I realized how quickly our generation focuses on the best - how we always try to be the best at something, to be better than someone, to do something better than how we have done it in the past. Perhaps we should realize the actions we do, our careers, our lives isn't up for comparison, but rather, to acknowledge that our experiences are just different. Perhaps it is about time that we recognize that our journeys are all individually beautiful.
I tried to show him some of the sunset pictures I took in the city this past summer from my phone. He smiled and thanked me for sharing but told me that he couldn't see because he needs glasses so my pictures were just a blur to him.
I realized it's funny how without pictures, I do not posses methods of explaining the beauty of the sunsets to this man. I guess gone were the times when human-kind only had their disposal of words and figurative language to express their emotions.
Along with apologizing for his sight, the man beside me apologized for his hearing, for making me repeat things. He said that his hearing is mostly gone now and most of the time he just nods yes yes without really knowing what the other person is saying. We both laughed because we know that happens even if you haven't lost year hearing.
He pointed in front of his seat, "I am surprised that they don't have the screens. Usually they have them here or at least up there," he pointed to the wall the front of the cabin.
"Yeah," I answered, "a lot of the domestic flights don't have it anymore. You have to download an app in advance for in-flight entertainment."
I found it interesting that he brought that up. I have almost not noticed that they have taken away the screens. In the last few years since airline companies have allowed the "small handheld devices", I have been relying more on the music that downloaded on my phone for entertainment. An airplane screen that only played six movies on channels was too limiting for me. The experience wasn't personal enough. I couldn't stop and rewind whenever I wanted, or skip to a section on command.
It didn't used to bother me. When I was a child, I was beyond happy with watching one movie play in the general screen. But now, after always having the choice of what I consume in all places in life, one singular screen isn't enough for me. I would rather sleep if there was just one movie option playing.
That was when I noticed that as a passenger I was always occupied, always stimulated either by the music in my ears, my computer, or the pen and paper I have brought with me to write. Here this man was. He brought nothing with him besides his jacket and had relied on the potential of a screen in front of him as his source of amusement.
I took a look at everyone else around the cabin. Everyone else had their computers open, headphones in, or was asleep. He was the only one who was truly disconnected.
And from being truly disconnected, there was also boredom. He constantly twiddled his thumbs or gazed forward as if searching for something. He would sometimes lean back and look ahead, maybe taking time to think.
So there I was, his only source of amusement.
For me, it was so easy to plug in and create a world within myself, away from the environment I am physically surrounded by. I will admit that there were times I wished he wouldn't turn to face me and utter words, forcing me to hit pause on the jazz trap track I was listening to and take off my red headphones. But I soon realized that I can listen to this song any other time. Meanwhile, there was only this one opportunity for me to get to know someone, for me to see into someone's life who is so different in age and occupation to me.
He said one day we'll run into each other again.
"Huh?" I was caught by surprise from my thought bubble.
He repeated, "One day we will run into each other again - and I will see that you have become the CEO of some large company."
I told him I don't know about that.
He said he knows it'll be some time but yes, he is excited for my success.
I told him that I don't know if being a leader in a large corporation is what I wanted to do with my life. I explained that if I was to become a leader of some organization, I hope it is a company or a team that I am proud of leading.
He smiled.
I realized I don't know what part of his life he is at. Were these thoughts he has had before or has he been working just to make a living? Have I just overstepped, acted too naive, too privileged. I wondered how he might have judged me at the moment. Was I too unrealistic?
I re-calibrated my thoughts. I am right, I don't know anything about his life. Maybe he has had the same thoughts too. That just because he had started off working in carpentry to make a living doesn't mean he didn't have had his own dreams.
When the lights flickered on and the landing beep sounded, it occurred to me that we haven't properly introduced ourselves yet.
"Ighigor," he introduced himself.
I squinted my eyes, "Ighigor?"
"Victor," he clarified.
"Ah, Victor. I'm Helen." I smiled personally acknowledged that this flight was a special one, that I will always remember this day.
Victor used his fingers to draw out my name on the fleece blue seat in front of me.
H-E-L-E-N
"Ah Helen. It was nice to meet you Helen. It was great chatting with you and getting to know your thoughts." He held out his hand.
I shook his hands, "It was nice to meet you too Victor."
As he grabbed his jacket he said, "Next time when you walk around Philadelphia, especially at University Park, think of me and how I have worked on probably all of these buildings."
Comments