Out of the Blue: Let the laughter fly

Recently, while serving passengers aboard an A-300 Airbus, I was startled by a discordant sound. The sound alerted my post-9/11 flight-attendant sensibilities and sent me scurrying from the first-class cabin to investigate.

I pushed past the curtains, entered the main cabin and stopped in my tracks. The sound repeated itself, again and again -- a thunderous sound that left my jaw unhinged. I had "responded" to the loud laughter.

I gazed upon a sea of chuckling faces. Strangers, squeezed together in coach-class proximity, were watching the in-flight presentation of Legally Blonde. And they were laughing.

Perhaps 100 people stared up at the television monitors, unmindful of fortified cockpit doors and F-16 escorts and the threat of terrorism that necessitates these things. This was flying the way it ought to be.

One woman laughed so hard that tears ran from her eyes and she doubled over.

I stood in the front of the cabin feeling good. Really good. In recent months, passengers and crew have been afraid to laugh on airplanes. Many who weren't afraid found it awkward to do so: Laughter seemed inappropriate. But we need to laugh now.

Laughter, coupled with the passage of time, helps heal sorrow. I learned this lesson well after a family tragedy on New Year's Day.

That morning I woke with a mild hangover. I crawled out of bed, turned on the television, and prayed that CNN would allay my fears of bad news. It did: There were no airline-related catastrophes reported that day.

Then the telephone rang. A relative called to tell me that my father died. She had found his body reclining on his living room sofa. He had been watching television when his arteries apparently closed down for good.

A few days later, I flew to Chicago for my father's memorial service. Ironically, the service was scheduled on the day that should have been the happiest of my life: My book, Plane Insanity, had just been published, and I had appeared on two local TV news shows that morning.

At noon I kicked off a six-city book tour with a reading at Borders Books in downtown Chicago. A few hours after the reading, I stood in front of yet another microphone and read my father's eulogy.

Allow me to take a step backward.

When my sister arrived at Borders to hear me read, she was carrying a satchel. Inside the satchel was a box. And inside the box lay the cremated remains of my father. He had been ecstatic about the publication of my book, and I was heartbroken because he would never hear me read from it. But now, with help from a busy funeral director and my family, my father managed to attend the reading anyway.

When I finished, a Borders manager approached.

"I'm sorry to hear about your loss," he said.

"Thanks so much," I replied. "But my father was with us at the reading today."

"I'm sure he was," said the Borders manager.

"No, no, he really was," I said.

"I'm sure he was here in spirit," replied the manager, laying a gentle hand upon my shoulder.

"No really," I insisted, pointing to my sister's satchel. "He actually attended the reading. His cremated ashes are in there."

The Borders manager covered his mouth with both hands and gasped. His eyes grew as large as satellite dishes. I couldn't help but laugh.

After realizing it was okay for him to do so, too, the manager laughed along with me. My sister, who had been crying in the Self Help section 30 minutes earlier, laughed, too. That laughter helped get me through one of the most difficult days in my life.

The same thing happened during my return flight to Miami.

Eyes filled with tears, I sat in a window seat staring at passing clouds and thinking about my father. But when the startled face of the Borders manager popped into my mind, I laughed for the remainder of the flight. I laughed, and I felt better.

As airline passengers endure long lines at check-in counters and security checkpoints, as we are subjected to bag searches and shoe removal, as we trundle through crowded airport terminals on our way to crowded airplanes, let's not forget to bring our sense of humor. Sometimes it's the only thing that gets us through the day.

- Elliott Hester is a flight attendant for a major U.S. airline. He is also the author of "Plane Insanity: A Flight Attendant's Tales of Sex, Rage and Queasiness at 30,000 Feet," published in January by St. Martin's Press.

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