Strangers’ Small Acts That Changed Lives Forever: Stories That Will Restore Your Faith in Humanity
I hate flying. I’m terrified of it. Back in 1995, I was flying home from grad school, short flight. We are landing so I’m thinking YAY, I’m still alive when suddenly s**t starts bouncing around. I know we didn’t fall super far but it felt like we were falling pretty significantly. My seatmate’s drink spilled, an overhead compartment opened and stuff fell out, people were gasping and there were some yells. Outside the window is sort of greenish grey. At some point, I calmly took my seatmate’s hand–total stranger, older white guy. I said how scared I was and he immediately started telling me that he flies every week and trying to explain about turbulence.
We went back up in the air and got rerouted to another city about three hours away from where we were supposed to be. Dude is super nice, trying to distract me by showing me pictures of his kids, talking about his job and family, asking me things. We land after being told we have the option of taking another flight back home. No way in hell am I getting on another plane. Dude says he is going to rent a car and can drop me off since he lives near where I was living with my mom.
48-year-old me would be telling myself OMG THIS GUY COULD BE CRAZY, KIDNAP YOU, K**L YOU but 23-year-old me was like, “Sure!” Dude drives us back shows me his CAR PHONE like holy cow what sorcery is this?! Calls his wife, I meet her over the phone, everything was awesome. I tried to pay him for gas but he wouldn’t hear of it.
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