#11: Attention Passengers: Throwing Up is Prohibited on This Flight

  When I was 14, my family thought it would be a great idea to visit our nation's capitol. I love traveling and was all for it. However, traveling, as the word implies, means you have to travel to get to your destination, which is, the last time I checked, everyone's least favorite part of visiting places.
  The day of our flight arrived. It was a morning flight, and we live about an hour from the airport, so we had to get up around five in the morning. I woke up feeling sort of sick to my stomach, but brushed it off, figuring it was probably just from waking up so early (but I was taking early-morning seminary, so I should have ruled that idea out from the get-go.) We got to the airport and decided to breakfast at the McDonald's located on the way to our gate. Now, I have never been a huge fan of fast-food breakfast. Something about it, no matter where it's from or what it is, always makes me feel ill. I ate some hashbrowns and orange juice anyway.
   We eventually boarded our plane and we headed on our way toward the next airport where we would have a layover. The flight was at least a couple hours, and not too long into the flight, I really started feeling queasy. I glanced at the bathroom, but there was a rather long wait. So I decided I would wait until the line got shorter. But my insides did not have the courtesy to wait. My stomach began to churn in a most uncomfortable manner. But I held strong. About 15 minutes later, I looked toward the restroom again, and to my dismay, the line was not any shorter. So I waited.
    Not too long afterwards, my internal systems started sending out S.O.S. signals, and I knew it was now or never. I joined the long line to the bathroom, hoping I would make it by the time the five or so people in front of me had done their business.
   Then, without preparation, Old Faithful erupted. While I was in line. The most amazing thing, however, was that somehow I managed to keep my mouth closed. This feat made me look something similar to a chipmunk...only not as cute.
    I immediately realized I was in a unique predicament and began to panic. I couldn't just release my regurgitated breakfast all over the aisle in front of more than a hundred passengers, and I was unable to vocalize my urgent necessity as my mouth was...uh...clogged. I hurried to the back of the plane, where a caucasian stewardess and an asian steward were. Since I was unable to talk, I just stood there and helplessly looked at them with my hands to my water-balloon-like mouth. It took them about three eternally long seconds to realize my problem. The male grabbed a paper department store shopping bag and held it out to me, which I promptly grabbed. Unfortunately, the bag was only partially situated in the "splash zone" and as I released, only half of it made it into the bag, while the other portion of my internalized culinary concoction cascaded to the floor into a pile of putrid slop. I stood there, holding my improvised barf bag, hunched over in shame. I don't why it mattered, but I felt that I needed the flight crew to know that I wasn't some wimpy motion sickly person, so I muttered something like, "I'm not motion sick...." and watched them pour something resembling baking soda over what had not landed in my bag.
   I honestly cannot remember any of what happened in the next couple hours. I don't remember giving the bag back, or going back to my seat to endure the remainder of the flight in helpless misery, but I do vividly remember puking out every last ounce of sprite I had drank earlier to supposedly calm my tummy down on the next flight into the handily provided throw-up bag of the pocket of the seat in front of me. I also vividly remember the horrific disgusted expression of my younger sister's face, who unfortunately had been seated next to me, and would have rather been in any other place than where she currently was. I am sorry Kathryn.
   By the time we made it to our hotel in Virginia, my stomach had successfully rejected every particle I had tried to consume that day. My mom vocally wondered if I had an intestinal blockage. Me eating dinner was definitely out of the question, so my family left to eat while I stayed behind in the hotel room. But the idea of a possible intestinal blockage horrified me so much, that not even sixty seconds after everyone had left, I went to my bed and sobbed my eyes out and prayed and prayed that I would be okay. I had horrible visuals of me needed emergency surgery in an unfamiliar place and ruining our family vacation.
  Fortunately, I recovered. When Family returned I nibbled on some crackers, which gratefully stayed down. By the next day I was completely fine.
   Unfortunately, a few days before the trip ended. I caught a terrible cold that stayed until we went home. Sigh. It was a hopeless battle.