Learn to Fly

I dress to fly.

When I fly, I like to look sophisticated, clean and sexy, and at the absolute least, neat and pretty. I meet a lot of people when I travel, so first impressions are crucial. I’ll wear maybe a sleek black skirt with a black tank top. Maybe a black loose sheath dress, or a white dress shirt with a pencil skirt. If it’s very hot, maybe a sundress, and if it’s cold, cashmere. Always cashmere. I’ll wear a small heel that I can slip off in the security line, so usually a kitten heel or a leather mule. Diamond studs, clean minimal makeup, maybe a hooded cardigan to slip over my tank top in case the plane is chilly.

I don’t dress for where I am going, I dress for where I am. I don’t wear a floppy muumuu just because I’m going to Hawaii. You won’t catch me in clunky boots and a ski parka just because I’m landing in Alaska. If the weather of my destination is substantially different than from the airport I fly out of, I will pack the correct clothes in my overhead. When I landed in Iceland, I was wearing Nicole Miller. Within five minutes, I had changed and looked like a local in black tights, black boots and a 66º North jacket.

It may sound pretentious, but since traveling is a privilege, I dress for that privilege.

Oh, so you say you like to wear pajama pants? Natty worn yoga tights with an oversized t-shirt? A faded jean jacket with jeans? Even worse, you don’t put one single thought into it, and just wear whatever? What a tragedy, because you are missing out on one of the easiest opportunities to bring joy and significance into your life.

“I want to be comfortable,” is the most often-repeated excuse for looking like a slob on an airplane, especially for a trip, say, to Australia, a brutal flight that takes 24 hours. But what’s more comfortable than a cool cotton skirt and tank top from Prana, with a warm cardigan and a pair of low sling-backs? Or a pair of sleek black tights, an oversized slouchy cashmere sweater and a pair of leather ankle boots?

“Who cares?” others say.

I care. I care how I present. I can’t babble nonsense about the attractiveness of trash cans and then look shoddy and cheap on a flight to Boston.

Here is a small list of other things I find important to have stocked away in my leather tote bag when I fly:

1. *No smelly food onto the plane.
2. Noise-cancelling headphones
3. Burts Bees tinted lip balm
4. Tin of Altoids
5. A small Moleskin notebook and a Pilot pen
6. A small novel and one interesting magazine
7. Squares of dark chocolate
8. Small bottle of Fiji water
9. Sunglasses
10. Breathe spray
11. Visine Allergy drops
12. Portable back-up phone charger

*Please try to get to the airport early enough to eat in the airport, so you don’t have to haul chicken fingers, garlic bread knots, greasy pizza, tuna-fish sandwiches or meat-stuffed burritos into such a close space as an airplane. Have some consideration, and realize the smell is unbearable to others, no matter how hungry you are or how good it smells to you. Or bring something that has no odor, like vegetable sticks, a muffin or plain bagel.

Notice the lack of electronics on the list. I don’t worry myself with electronics. I know, I know, I’ve seen the people with their iPhones, iPads, laptops, etc. That stuff definitely helps pass the time. But when I fly, I like to enjoy the experience, and watching five movies on a laptop doesn’t do it for me. I like to listen to beautiful music, read beautiful literary passages or maybe some poetry. I’ll shut my eyes and think about good sex, I’ll listen to Handels’ Water Music, or Vivaldi’s Four Seasons. Since I usually fly first-class (more on that later), I am afforded the space I need to relax and zone out, mind-boggled at the thing that is air travel.

There is not one thing in your life, trash cans included, that you cannot devote yourself wholeheartedly into making it a beautiful experience. Use cute bags to pick up your dog’s poo. Buy the patterned paper towels that are fifty cents more expensive than your usual cheap brand. Wear kitschy socks under your boots, even if no one knows they are there (that goes for beautiful sexy lingerie as well- MUCH MORE on that another time). My favorite pair right now are a recent gift from a friend, and depict a woman with a book and the caption, “Fuck off, I’m reading.”

Be grateful for the fact that you can board an airplane and land in a different place that will, no matter how insignificant it may seem, change you. And let your dress reflect that.