Fear of Not Flying

My personal air travel in the past few years, except for a couple of fortuitous upgrades to First Class, has not been much fun, or even very comfortable. The degradation of the inflight experience is routinely familiar to all airport check-ins. Given what I read in the media, we can, apparently, expect much worse in time to come. Airline companies are becoming Trailways of the air.

Something I have looked forward to all my life -- getting on a plane and taking off into the blue -- is now beginning to look like a grim undertaking. But, like Southern Californians who can't give up their cars, I will always have to book a flight.