Flight plan

It's been far too long since I last had to sit with a one year old on a plane. Far too long. If only I had dredged those smoldering brain cells through the smog of potty training and Getting Rid of the Dummy, I may have grasped a scant wisp of the time we took Isla abroad aged one-and-a-bit, and warned myself firmly off it (I love it when I'm firm with myself). But no, that's the trick of children you see, they tire you out so completely and supply such an endless stream of inane but urgent questions to be answered that the really important stuff lies dormant. So like lambs to the slaughter, or idiots to the £39 both ways website (what they forgot to mention was that they meant £39 cubed), we convinced ourselves of Jack's cherubic nature under stress and opted for two and a half hours with a one year old and a four year old stuck inside a metal tube. Ah relaxation here we come.
We were the only people with children on the plane. Do you hear me at the back? The only people with children on the plane. And we walked on last. Late. And Jack needed his nappy changing. It was a sober moment. Even the plane seemed to sigh its displeasure and sank ever deeper into the tarmac, as if it wanted to tuck its cockpit under its wing and just sleep the ordeal away. The ordeal of children in an enclosed space. An enclosed space where they absolutely have to be tied to a seat for a significant proportion of the time. It was the law in fact, there was no choice about the tying to the seat thing, and the less choice there is is directly proportional to the level of protest that will be made. Guaranteed (apparently Einstein had a really good theory about it and even produced an equation, but everybody was so caught up in the theory of relativity thingy it sort of got lost).
We entered the plane employing the First Rule Of Entering A Plane With Children: make absolutely no eye contact whatsoever with anybody. Do not look up, do not pass go/collect 200. Unless in a brief second you glimpse another parent when you are entitled to catch a glance, nod ruefully at each other and then sort of smile in a we're in it together kind of way. Of course you aren't and you're secretly hoping that their child is a little monster and drowns out any noise your angel makes cooing happily at the sick bag. In fact you even attempt an quick administer of a smarty to their child as you pass, hoping the sugar will create the desired effect.
The second rule is never ever to apologise as you go, thus pointing out to all that you are aware that you are bringing several unwanted passengers into the metal tube. Passengers who kick seats/make a mess/crawl in the aisle/pull hair/insist on using (and blocking) the toilet every ten minutes. Yup, that was us, the lepers, heading to our seats, daring to attempt a holiday.
Doom descended along the aisles, the stewardess swapped the little basket of boiled sweets that she was handing round with a little basket of Prozac, using a sleight of hand that Paul Daniels would be proud of (maybe even a little jealous of; she was a lot better looking than him and had all her own hair, but I doubt she had a wife called Debbie so he could probably use that to cheer himself up). The pilot came through from the cockpit to personally speed up the handing round of alcohol as we walked, the funeral march playing resoundingly in everybody's heads.
As we got closer the Zone of Despair thickened, reaching crescendo level around rows 13-15ABCDEF, everybody eyed the empty 14ABC with suspicion and contempt. Our seats. No one looked up as we sat down, instead the the instructions on the sick bags became crucial and compelling reading (something that never seems to be achieved with the inflight magazine, despite the recent craze for including porn). As we sat, a man in front gave a disapproving sniff and turned away in disgust. We placed Isla in the seat directly behind him and forgot to mention the no-seat-kicking rule.
We rustled and bustled, found bags and colouring books, and then at last we had it. We could look up now, even attempt a grin. The members of The Zone of Despair looked around. An audible sigh reverberated around, smiles of approval, shuffles as people made themselves comfortable and cracked open broadsheets, crikey I even detected a ruffle of high fives. There was something you see, that I had brought out of the smouldering remains of my brain cells, this was no ordinary mummy-on-a-plane. I had bought chocolate.