The Blog<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On my way back from the bathroom I am forced to wait behind\na shoji screen because a waitress delivering wooden platters of unagi is\nblocking my path. From the other side of the screen I hear, \u201cHe totally boned\nme on the racquetball court today.\u201d Unfortunately this is coming from my table.\nWorse, from my date, a personal trainer from my gym. He is now, minus me,\nflirting with his best friend\u2019s girlfriend. \u201cI think he\u2019s doping. Seriously.\u201d They\nall laugh.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On her flight to Seattle, Meredith read and re-read this\nparagraph, feeling compassless and dissatisfied. She hasn\u2019t posted to\nher\/Jennifer\u2019s blog in thirteen days, the longest dry spell since she started\nit after getting downsized from the Philadelphia Inquirer five years ago. Her old\neditor asked her, in her new capacity as a freelancer, to do a story on local\nblogs. Meredith was surprised to learn that some of them were pulling in not\ninsignificant amounts of ad revenue. Since being laid off, money was tight, so\nMeredith found herself wondering if she could supplement her freelance income\nwith a blog. If the writing skills of the people she interviewed were any\nindication, it shouldn\u2019t be that hard. Though she suspected the audience for a\n48-year-old unemployed journalist living in a small apartment with her cat was\nprobably marginal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So she created a woman named Jennifer, a 29-year-old\ngraphic artist living in the Silver Lake neighborhood of Los Angeles. Jennifer,\nunlike Meredith, dated regularly, dressed fashionably, cooked, went to a gym,\nenjoyed improving the d\u00e9cor of her small, but charming, apartment. Her\nlifestyle was suspiciously, if one were cynically minded, tailored to\nattracting a variety of advertisers\u2014websites selling Le Creuset enameled\ncookware, organic herbs and spices, modern housewares, shoes, clothes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Meredith, in contrast, lived with the dark, outdated\nfurniture she inherited from her mother, ate the same sandwich everyday for\nlunch (turkey and Swiss cheese on rye), and felt sufficiently exercised if she\nventured out to pick up her take-out dinner instead of having it delivered. She\ndressed almost exclusively from the Land\u2019s End catalog, usually the women\u2019s slim\nankle chino with a blue or white 3\/4 sleeve solid supimo no iron shirt. She\nhadn\u2019t been on a date in eight years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Nonetheless, Meredith initially found she had an easy\nfacility with The Jennifer Voice, as she called it. \u201cIs anyone still wearing\nthe thong?\u201d began one of her more popular posts, entitled \u201cPerma-Murphy.\u201d This\npost concluded with an ode to the boy short which landed Meredith a long\nrunning ad for a lingerie website. Another post, called \u201cTramp Stamp\u201d detailed\nthe removal of a Celtic tattoo from Jennifer\u2019s lower back. This post generated\na vigorous debate in the comments section on whether or not girls\/women who\nhave these tattoos were more promiscuous than non-tattooed women. Meredith\ndidn\u2019t realize, until this post, that she had so many male readers. She also\nnoted that when Jennifer\u2019s posts veered into sexual territory, her website\ntraffic spiked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thus Meredith began to phase out recipes\u2014\u201cPan Seared\nScallops, So Easy to Make at Home!\u201d\u2014and introduced more intimate revelations. A\ntwo month lesbian relationship beginning with \u201cGirl on Girl\u201d and ending with \u201cA\nLeopard Can\u2019t Change Her Spots\u201d boosted her stats enormously and won Meredith\/Jennifer\na best blog award from an organization she had never heard of.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But five years into this enterprise, Meredith was finding\nit increasingly difficult to come up with new material. She closed her laptop\nand put it back in its travel bag, cramming it under the seat in front of her. She\nconsidered going over the itinerary for the conference she was covering in\nSeattle for a neuroscience journal, when the plane suddenly nose-dived. Gasps\nand a few screams erupted throughout the cabin, but then the plane stabilized\nand a few people cheered. Meredith could see the cheers were premature however,\nsince a faint trail of wispy gray smoke was coming from under the right wing. Next\nthe plane began vibrating and the fasten seat belt signs binged on. For four or\nfive minutes, the passengers waited nervously for an announcement, whispering\nanxiously and futilely pressing their flight attendant buttons. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFolks,\u201d the pilot began in an avuncular tone, \u201cwe\u2019re experiencing\na little engine issue and, ahh, we\u2019ll be making an emergency landing in\nChicago. We expect to be there in\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The announcement abruptly cut out followed by more gasps\nfrom the passengers and what sounded to Meredith like the early stages of a panic\nattack somewhere a few rows behind her. Meanwhile, the plane was vibrating more\nintensely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe should be landing in 25 minutes, folks,\u201d the pilot\nfinished. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
From her window seat, Meredith could see the smoke coming\nfrom the wing was now no longer wispy and a much darker shade of grey. For a\nfew minutes, Meredith contemplated a crash landing she wouldn\u2019t survive. Should\nshe write something? A good-bye, some apologies, meaningful last words? What\nwould be the point, especially considering her laptop would likely be a melted,\nfumy blob after the crash. Meredith\u2019s heart was pounding so hard she thought\nshe might have a heart attack or stroke out before she had a chance to die the\nhorrible plane crash death that she was visualizing. She looked at her watch\nand realized she still had 20 minutes until the crash landing. What are you\nsupposed to do with your last 20 minutes? Should she close her eyes, pull down\nthe window shade? Or should she watch the whole terrifying conclusion from her\nlittle window? They were supposed to fold over onto their knees, though\nMeredith has never been clear on the life saving benefit of this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Soon they were low enough that Meredith could see the\nrunway. Ambulances were already in place, foam coated their landing strip, and\na number of fire trucks were waiting nearby. As they got closer, Meredith\nclutched her armrests and prepared for impact. At the last moment, she decided\nto crouch over and close her eyes, unable to watch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The plane landed hard, bounced, then made contact with the ground again, fishtailing. The nauseating feeling of the plane\u2019s weight skidding sideways filled Meredith\u2019s body, but then the plane aligned itself and continued its forward momentum. Acrid smoke wafted into the plane cabin, a combination of jet fuel and burning plastic. The plane eventually slowed, then stopped, and workers rushed the plane with hoses and flame retardants. Nobody cheered this time. Instead, the passengers watched and waited, some approached the flight attendants to find out how and when they would be allowed to get off the plane.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFolks,\u201d the pilot finally announced, \u201cwe\u2019re waiting for\na vehicle to come and tow us to our gate. If everyone could just be patient,\nit\u2019ll just be a few more minutes.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Twenty minutes later, the passengers were still waiting\nin their seats, headachy from the smoke. Meredith watched the airport workers\nmilling around on the tarmac. They looked bored. \u201cHow long\u2019s this shit going to\ntake,\u201d she imagined them thinking. \u201cIt\u2019s fucking freezing out here.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Finally, Meredith felt the plane lurch forward. Five more\nminutes and she is dragging her carry-on bag off the plane and into the\noverheated airport. They are instructed to wait at the gate for another plane\nto arrive and take them to Seattle. Meredith parked her carry-on bag and sat\ndown, a little shaky but more stable than she would have expected. She was\nfeeling a little low blood sugary so she opened her bag to locate the peanut\nM&M\u2019s she bought earlier in the Philadelphia airport. Some vestige of her younger\njournalist self surfaced and began imagining the reporting she could do on this\nevent. If she were still employed at the Philadelphia Inquirer, she would have\ncalled her editor and pitched a story, probably something involving reduced\nstandards in airplane maintenance. Hadn\u2019t she recently heard a podcast on\nairline\u2019s cost-cutting measures, including contracting out airplane repairs to\ncompanies whose workers were in fact auto mechanics? Maybe she just flew in a\nplane whose engine was repaired by a guy who normally repairs Volvos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But Meredith, even if she had someone to call, is not really interested in writing this story because what just happened to her is blog gold. Meredith crumpled up her M&M\u2019s bag, lobbed it into a nearby garbage can, then opened her laptop. She logged into Jennifer\u2019s blog, clicked on \u201cnew post,\u201d and typed \u201cI Just Almost Died\u201d in the title box.<\/p>\n\n\n\n