Four Hours of Torture, Courtesy of American Airlines

I’ve been a member of the American Airlines Aadvantage program for many years and, if I’m not flying Hawaiian Airlines (always my first choice), I’m usually on American. I’ve never kept track, but I’d guess I’ve probably logged more than a three-quarters of a million miles on American over the years. (That’s what happens when you live in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, at least 2300 miles from anywhere.)

At the moment, I’m en route to a NARP board meeting and yesterday I flew from Maui to Los Angeles and from there on to Chicago, all on American. The 5-hour flight to LA was full, but OK. The nearly four-hour flight to Chicago was awful.

By luck of the draw, I was in a window seat in a row of three seats immediately in front of an exit row. Apparently for that reason, my seat wouldn’t recline more than two or three inches. Worse — much worse — it’s “full upright position” was almost perfectly vertical. Try that sometime. Your back starts aching and you cannot rest any of the weight of your head on the seat back. After just a half hour or so, it starts getting uncomfortable; after a couple of hours, it’s torture.

Worse, when the guy in the seat in front of me reclined his seat, my “space” was further reduced to the point that my tray table — remember, it’s attached to the back of his seat — was literally pressing against my chest. The conditions in our row were so cramped, I had to ask my two seat mates to get up and slide out into the aisle, so I could also struggle out into the aisle just to remove my sport coat.

No one should be forced to spend four hours under those conditions … let alone pay for the “privilege”. One more among many reasons to opt for the train if you have the time.