I had a flight from Denver to San Jose recently. On that flight, my two seat companions were strangers to me and to each other. I planned to read from The Tin Drum by Günter Grass. However, my two seat companions decided to engage in very loud and inane small talk unceasingly for two and a half straight hours. To those two people I have to say: I hate you.
I know I am much more misanthropic than I really should be. It isn’t good, or healthy. After all, these people had a perfect right to talk. I should have brought ear plugs. However, two and a half hours straight is just too much. The fact that they didn’t even seem to notice me trying to read with my fingers stuffed into my ears was even worse…if not downright rude.
I mean, could they at least have lowered their voices a little? I could hear what they were saying even with my fingers in my ears. Even over the noise of the plane. They may have had the right to do it, but I can’t stop myself from hating them completely now.
Also, the level of inanity of the conversation did not help. They talked about the vitamin pill pyramid scheme the woman had received literature for. They talked about baseball the guy used to play (very long ago) when he was a youth. I imagine they enjoyed the conversation immensely (I think they were flirting), but I did not. Further, I was not involved in the conversation and had no way of removing myself from it. I had to be part of their two and a half hour inane conversation whether I liked it or not (I did not).
It may be misanthropic to hate people for this. I may be an asshole, but I can’t help this. All they had to do was give it a rest now and then, or talk quieter. Perhaps they could have even found interesting things to talk about, or pick up the hint when I jammed my fingers in my ears and tried to read. Regardless, they did not do any of these potentially courteous things and, whether or not it is wrong, I will hate them forever.
