At takeoff during flights I used to listen to Frank Sinatra’s “My Way” and I’d time it so that the crescendo happens right at the moment we take off and start to gain altitude. Why? It added to the intensity of the experience that’s for sure but mainly I did it because I knew without a shadow of doubt that the plane would crash and I would die. I thought “if it’s going to crash and if this is it for me then at least I get to listen to a fucking good song while it happens”.
A lot of young people assume they’re going to die in plane crashes or freak car accidents or some other relatively unlikely event. I think it’s narcissistic of us. We assume we’re the one who this extremely rare event will befall, odds be damned. Personally I see newspaper headlines in my mind when planes get a little turbulent, they torment me with every specific bit of knowledge I can remember about the flight and then mention the number who died and I see my name on the page… And then once again I load up Sinatra and accept my unlikely fate, which is still yet to meet me.
It’s only recently that I’ve stopped this habit, however I will admit that “That’s life” was playing as the plane ascended today – not on purpose… Promise.
I’ve stopped because… Well I think it’s because I don’t think I’m going to die in some freak accident anymore. Maybe my narcissism is finally abating, though writing about this suggests otherwise.
Regardless, I don’t think I’m going to die anymore in one of these abstract and unlikely ways, in all likelihood I’ll probably go out the way most people do: meandering into a slower old age and gradually seeing my body slip into decline and eventually succumbing to my frailty. Boring but statistically pretty likely.
I wonder if age and experience caused me to change my perspective. I’ve taken a lot of flights and not died… Yet.
As far as I can tell, the people who’ve lived more than me, in years at least, don’t suffer this same anxiety that fate will target them with some rare life-ending event. Perhaps because they’ve lived for long enough to know that the unlikely to happen is even more unlikely to happen to them.
Anyway, my plane’s about to land and I have music to queue up so for now I’ll take a leaf out of their book and embrace this philosophy: the worst case is unlikely and things will, probably, be okay and if not, well, that’s life.
Quotes I’m vibing with rn:
Gifts of fortune are not to be regarded as your own. What fortune gives, it may also take away – Seneca
Sympathy for all is tyranny for thee, my good neighbour – Friedrich Nietzsche
He was bored, that’s all, bored, like most people; so he created from scratch a life of complications and drama for himself. Something’s got to happen that’s the explanation for most human undertakings. – Albert Camus
Favourite song for now:
Sumb Luck 