Landing in Gyropolous

Flight 789 from Atlanta to Athens landed at 11:15am Athens time. He had spent the flight trying to sleep in the hope of waking up in the Athens morning none the wiser that he was hours off from his typical routine. Instead, he had spent 10 hours tossing and turning in a feverish fight for some lucidity and peace. The video unit on the 747 had been announced as frozen and unresponsive adding to the sense of isolation from the world. Luckily, Jim had brought his video iPod to watch, but staring at movie images on a tiny screen only made him more nauseous.

The only thing he could focus on was the frigid air coming from the windows in the cabin of the plane and the little plane image mapped out on its course to Greece. On more than one occasion, Jim began to hallucinate that the plane was turning in big circles instead of moving towards its destination and delaying them for hours on end without sleep in sight. When the plan did make it across the Atlantic ocean and Europe was visible on the map, Greece often appears in the form of an gyro firing tzatziki at the plane until, blinded by tiny chunks of cucumber, the plane overshot Greece and crashed into Turkey which looked like a giant falafel.

The mediocre US dinner time/ Greek breakfast time meal of ricotta stuffed manicotti coated in what was labelled as a tomato sauce but could have been a generic red toothpaste for the flavor it had. Luckily for Jim, the bland salad dressing cancelled out the main course. As a change from his previous unsettled condition, Jim was now graced with a heartburn that made him wish for the frigid breeze despite his concern on where this much air could be coming from on an airplane.

Movement from next to him cleared the map image from his mind. His wife had put in her ear plugs and a sleeping mask nearly 3 hours into the flight and had drifted off to blissful sleep instantly. She only awoke every few hours to stretch her legs to avoid any circulatory problems from the long plane ride. Sarah was comfortable in any position and had been found asleep in her closet one morning when she was supposed to be at an 8am class in college. Her had was wedged against a shoe box and her legs hung out of the closet as the door continued to bounce open and closed against her feet. Her roommate feared Sarah had narcolepsy and anticipated a long year of high maintenance demands to break into the bathroom or make sure the stove top was turned off due to her sleeping roommate.


The truth of it was Sarah loved a good nap. This added to her requests for trips to Europe and the appreciation of the planned siestas there. She had wandered the streets of Paris enjoying shops and pounding coffee drinks. At the stroke of 3pm, she was asleep regardless of the liters of caffeine coursing through her body. Jim had been in Paris on a business trip and had found Sarah passed out with a cappuccino in her right hand and her purse laying open on the table in front of her. He quickly chased away a young boy intrigued by the easy pick pocketing mark and Jim sat for an hour until Sarah came back to life. They spent every day of her trip together after that and were married a year later.

The trip was meant to be a break from tough time back home where Jim had just lost his job, but received a severance large enough for a nice trip. They had discussed saving the money up for having a child together, but Sarah suggested they might enjoy a large amount of olive oil and lamb dishes more in the short term. Future be damned, they loved lamb. However, Jim reached the point at an hour left before landing in which he would have believed they were landing on the moon. As the wheels touched down and Jim finished choking down his bagel breakfast, he knew what a nervous breakdown must feel like.

By the time they reached customs, Jim had plenty to declare. There are many professions that take their jobs lightly enough to have a sense of humor. Customs officers at the Athens airport are not those people.