oxygen mask

I was among the last few to board. It was one of those tiny tubes of a plane, with two seats on each side of the aisle that wasn’t wide enough to pass without brushing on both sides.

A wave of nausea fell on me: claustrophobia. Twenty-one rows of eyes watched me wait for the passengers in front of me to stow their carry-ons and cram into their seats.

It was then that I recalled I had dreamed about oxygen masks.

I could see myself in fuzzy dream haze, a smile of placidity on my face, like the ones the flight attendants wear to demonstrate the calm manner in which this should all take place. I first secured the yellow cup to my face and tightened the straps. The bag did not inflate, though oxygen steadily flowed into the mask. Only then did I reach to help my neighbors.

I spent the whole flight wondering if I’d had another premonition of sorts, like the night before when I almost carried my ice pack and first aid kit to the Frisbee field rather than leaving them in the car the way I always did, three days a week, for at least three years now. This on the night Tom broke his fibula.

But we landed, under time. I didn’t take myself very seriously and forgot about it all until I was about to take off on the second leg of my trip and the safety demonstration began once more.

I thought, bemused, maybe this is the flight that will crash.

And then it hit me with a stronger wave of nausea than the claustrophobia.

That oxygen mask was my life. I have to learn to secure my own mask — take care of myself — first, before I can be of any help to anyone else. Otherwise, I’d soon be floundering on the ground, dying. And anyone I would have been capable of helping would have also been abandoned.