It was a dead-cold February morning. I and my wife planned this trip to her parents, my in-laws, which I am not particularly fond of, but, hell, a man gotta do what a man gotta do. I have an innate, organical, sensorial fear of planes. Flying. Heights. You name it. My other option was the train, but to reach the far north of Romania by train is a nightmare. 13 hours of pure hell in Romanian train, you have enough time to start a family, make kids, see them kids having kids and so on. Awful. So, yes, my repulsion for the train trip was bigger than my fear of flying. So I chose the damn plane.

That was a god damn mistake. I'll tell you that.

First of all, while carrying the god damn bags on the stairs, I twisted my ankle. I cursed the day I was born, that intense was the pain. I proceeded to walk like a zombie thru the hell of checking in, etc. Managed it. Gathered all my angels and happy thoughts and managed to get past the pain and the crowd, and the bureaucracy, etc.

Then we hopped on the damn plane. Wish I didn't. Some minions from the airport started to hit the plane with some crowbars or metallic things. I am guessing that they break the ice shards formed around the chassis. My anxiety levels were already spiking. Took a Xanax pill. Fuck it, no response. After the hitting, the minions retreated and a voice from the plane speakers said loudly "Good morning, I am Captain Scanteie!". Now "Scanteie" for you, the happy other languages speakers means nothing. It's ok, it's the damn Captain Scanteie. But "scantaie" in Romanian literally translates to spark. So, yes, fuck my life, Captain Spark was piloting the plane after those minions hit it with crowbars. What could go wrong? So he started the motors. Do you think they were those cool reaction motors? No, my friends, they were fucking propellers engines. Two of them. So, as I said, he started the engines. It was just after no more than 20 seconds that the entire plane electrical power just SHUT DOWN. You know that old Windows XP shutdown sound? Yeah, it was like that. Of course that my panic reached maximum boiling points so I started to mumble something in the language of the scared. My wife was just laughing at me. I managed to look on the window just to see the minions returning for more plane beating. I entered in a vegetative state, while they were pounding on the plane, Captain Spark assuring us that nothing is wrong, my wife laughing at my face grimace and my ankle getting bigger and bigger.

The whole flight I just been like that. Steady. Thinking about death. About afterlife. Cursing the trains, the in-laws, Tarom and their planes.

Btw, went directly to the hospital after landing as my ankle was turning into something else. A knee or something. So yea, was a nice holiday.