The 10 Types of People You See at the Airport

Image via Complex Original

Let's get this straight: You're flying out of Minneapolis on December 26 but you're wearing open-toed sandals without socks and cargo shorts from Old Navy. It's below freezing. Everyone else is dressed like they live in Minneapolis in the dead of winter—because they do—but you're stuffed in a Hawaiian shirt like a 7th grader circa 1999 who only wants to boogie to Lou Bega. Oh, you're going to Orlando? Now it makes sense. We hope Chip and Dale ignore your children.

The commotion starts in the back and works its way up the security line. Watch out, everyone, someone has a flight to catch. Just like everyone else, assman. Just because you're wearing a suit and own two different cell phones does not mean you get to fly to St. Louis faster than the rest of us. If you were truly like your idol, George Clooney in Up in the Air, you'd be using the line reserved for actual business assholes.

Please, don't let this be an international flight. Keep the obese in America, where they can't hurt the country's image in person.

They stand on the moving walk ways, sweating and unmoving. On the plane, they touch you even though you're in the next seat and they aren't trying. But they can't help the amount of flesh that squeezes into your space and settles next to your thigh, like a warm plastic bag full of Jell-O. It was never supposed to be this way.

Self-explanatory. They're loud. Their creators can't control them. The pressure changing in the cabin hurts their ears, but they're too young to do anything about it. They scream. It's not their fault. Still, they're awful, these red-faced pet-sized carry-ons that people love.

The special day is finally here! Mom and Dad have given their blessing and you'll be spending a night away from the house. No, it's not a sleepover. You're going to the airport. To fly somewhere. So why are you wearing brightly-colored sweatpants, slippers, and a sleeping mask?

"Did you pack your own bag?," the TSA agent asks. And you did, but only with Heath Ledger DVDs and Electronic Dream Phone. Also, you're half-asleep and drooling, the side effects of dressing for a slumber party.

Listen: When you travel in an airplane, you're actually a member of the public. You're actually going to interact with other humans—strangers, in fact. Dress like a real person, not a college student who just stepped out for a dime bag and a Slurpee.

Catch 'em going or coming back, it doesn't matter. The couple that thinks they can save the relationship with the perfect trip will only piss all over your pleasant jaunt.

If they're flying to sadness, you'll notice they're gritting their teeth, like they're both due for simultaneous enemas, or something else just as nice. The way they start sentences only to give up midway, as if the situation's so fragile that the wrong turn of phrase could fuck it all, even before they get to Sandals, that's a tell, too. They're holding hands because that small act of human kindness and the dimming prospect of hotel sex (maybe with eye contact?) is all they have before the inevitable.

And when the inevitable comes to pass, you'll find that they're not even starting sentences. They aren't touching. They don't look at each other. Sandals was a trap. The last chance was no chance at all.

Notice that airport convenience stores always stock pornographic magazines. And folks are buying. Hustle to your seat and look over at the dude flying to Vegas in the backwards ball cap. A copy of SkyMall sits in his lap like he needs to find something for his estranged aunt, stat—and luckily she loves stone gnomes that also massage your back and clean your pool. He begins to read and you steal a glance. Guess SkyMall sells shaved vulvas now.

Sidebar: How is this a guy? Who reads porn in public? Why is there enough evidence validating this stereotype's existence that dude gets a look?

Nothing like a transatlantic flight to get you serene. You'll answer all those emails from this window seat! You'll read so many longreads! Everything's coming up you. And then the joker ticketed for the aisle seat next to you plops down, wraps a blanket about their shoulders, pops a handful of Ambien, and dies. They won't move until you hit Heathrow. You're trapped. Have fun pissing your pants when you discover that you can't navigate around the corpse in the next seat.

Perhaps the saddest thing about flying is the pilot who spends his off-hours at the airport bar, writing new jokes on cocktail napkins. He's got a real doozy ready for the next time he flies to Idaho. The new material's a bit blue, but he's finally ready for edgier stuff. Might be what that poor sap in 7A needs to get him through this next paint thinner conference. Pilot Jokes can't wait to crack these open when he gets to announce the temperature in the city of arrival.

Wait—we lied. This isn't the saddest thing. That would still be the bearded Sikh catching a shakedown from the fat motherfucker in the TSA uniform.

It's writ large in his downward gaze and crinkled eyes. He knows that his beard and complexion will get him pulled out of line, because it's happened every other time. But nothing can stop the grubby hands of the TSA. The folks in blue with the rubber gloves toss his bags, put him behind a screen, scrutinize his shoes. Weary, he thinks: Life is a shit bucket. We agree, but it's not like we're trying to miss this flight to Miami, man, so sorry for not speaking up. You've got this list shout-out, though. Fight the power?