I do the same things every time I fly: I bring fruits and vegetables to snack on, I watch whatever movies they have that are over two hours to kill time, and I cry. Yup, I sob. Without fail, I get up to 30,000 feet and that’s when the tears start flowing.

To be clear, I cry a lot on the ground, too. And in water sometimes. Occasionally in a car or on a roof. More than once in a Nordstrom. I blame that on the unstudied rollercoaster of emotions from hormone spikes that come from aging as a woman, plus the fact that almost everything on earth is the worst it has ever been. But there is something about a plane cry that just hits right these days.

I just flew to LA for my friend Sahar’s gorgeous wedding. I’m no stranger to that trip, I make it several times a year for varying degrees of “business.” I had all of my staples with me: deli pint containers containing cheddar cheese and crackers, grapes, sliced cucumbers and peppers, and one with cold chicken nuggets--a new entry to the “from home plane snack” field and honestly the next MVP. Protein! I ordered a Diet Coke and a white wine and then fired up my screen to see what Delta offers in entertainment this month. The choice is obvious: the 1997 Jodie Foster epic, Contact.

I love this movie. There are a million reasons I love this movie. Jodie Foster’s incredible bone structure. Young Matthew McConaughey playing a preacher named Palmer Joss. Alan Silvestri’s stunning and emotional score to the film. Angela Bassett saying, “What interests me isn’t that it recorded static. What interests me is it recorded approximately 18 hours of it.” The undeniable 90s-ness of the entire package. It’s perfect.

But it also gives me multiple chances throughout the over two hour runtime to weep quietly in 22C. When Ellie’s dad dies in her childhood; when the powers that be don’t choose Ellie to go on the initial mission even though she discovered the message in the first place; when she finds out there’s a second machine; when no one believes her journey; this movie is just built for tearing up over Pittsburgh then Chicago then Iowa.

Studies show that we cry more easily on flights. I’m sure that’s true and has to do with the cabin pressure or how much oxygen there is or something. Maybe it’s the same data that proves ginger ale does taste better on board an airplane. I’m not a crying scientist so I don’t need to understand it. I’m a crying artist. It’s not the wine (I mean, it’s also not not the wine), or the pressure, or the dark cabin. It’s something beyond reason. It’s very “We come to this place for magic” but instead of Nicole Kidman in an AMC, it’s me sitting and sobbing in Comfort+.

I fly alone like 98% of my flights. I fly alone so often that the one time a year I’m oddly traveling with someone else I panic and feel the need to over-explain all of my little quirks and habits along the way, like how I simply must browse the magazines at Hudson News to see what exactly qualifies as a magazine at this point in culture. Taylor Swift the magazine? Sure. A magazine just about the Titanic? Why not? One just about horses? Well, no thank you.

Sometimes it’s nice to have a companion, like when Josh Gondelman and I were in Mobile, AL for a show and realized there wasn’t a single seltzer in the entire Mobile airport (if you’re keeping score, that’s actual anti-semitism, protesting an ongoing genocide is not). I wish I had someone with me when I was flying to meet my parents in Aruba and the person next to me brought on board what I could only describe as “the most personal items I have ever seen” and then proceeded to empty a bag of literal trash onto the empty middle seat between us.

Flying alone means dedicated quiet time by myself without people or obligations or distractions. I have plenty of that on the ground, too, but it’s different. At any point plans could come up, a call could get set, an emergency could break out. I could busy myself with unloading my dishwasher or organizing my closet. I might need to pull out my carpet cleaner because Rizz once again barfed on the rug after eating too fast. I could be--gasp--doing work alone and focusing on anything from the mind-numbing administrative email work of a freelance life to the thrilling yet sometimes devastatingly boring work of actual writing. Don’t get me wrong, I do bring my laptop on every flight with the idea that I might pull it out, but it mostly sits under the seat in front of me. Imagine opening Final Draft at 30,000 feet.

But flying is weirdly the one place where you know your time in your head is uninterrupted. At most, someone will ask what you want to drink, or at worst ask you to get up so they can use the restroom (I am a die-hard aisle seat, always have been, always will be). Even though I have wifi access and get texts, I still feel mostly unreachable up there. And I’m already doing something (flying) so the obligation to pull out a script or open a new doc or even really respond to an email goes out the window, which thankfully no one tries to open. My only job for these 5 hours is to sit there and not get into the kind of fight with someone over an armrest that goes viral.

And when all of that obligation is removed--I can cry. I can let whatever mix of emotions wash over me and cry. Crying on a plane isn’t something I newly started doing when the tentacles of fascism reached further into our lives the last few months. I’m not even a terrified flyer--though I am way more nervous now than I was when I was younger, and that’s not even counting when I read any of the latest FAA news. And the tears aren’t the choking/dry heaving/red faced ones that feel like catharsis or crisis. My eyes just well up at any feeling being telegraphed through that nine inch screen a foot from my face. Happy tears, sad tears, relief tears, they’re all the same up there. And I love it.

Being on a plane is a little like being in a city like New York: you’re surrounded by people but can still be completely alone. As long as you aren’t making noise, no one is paying attention to you in your seat. You can just dab your tears with the cocktail napkin from your Diet Coke and no one has to know.

Flying has become so dehumanizing. You’re reduced to a seat number, screamed at by the TSA just for standing 6 inches to the wrong side, spending a ton of money for basically for one soda, 70 calories of Sun Chips (at least they’re the best flavor, Garden Salsa), and not even a guarantee you and your stuff will arrive safely at your destination. You cross your fingers they aren’t out of a cheese snack plate by the time they get to your row. You try not to start a screaming match when someone three rows behind you is somehow flush with your seat the second the seatbelt sign is turned off at landing. And the world outside the airport and the plane isn’t much better. It’s nice to connect with yourself, to drop the barriers you put up to move through the world, and to just let the tears flow no matter the reason.

If you want to cry on a plane, might I suggest a few movies (all currently on Delta) to get you started. And don’t get mad about spoilers, everything on this list came out years ago!!!

Contact - I’ve already explained the glory of this movie. It’s so good. There is also a particularly prescient aspect to it as we watch the American science institutions disappear before our eyes at the hands of people who HAVE BENEFITED FROM THEIR EXISTENCE. Anyway, back to Contact. What else can I say, it’s Jodie Foster working hard and fighting for herself to travel space and time to communicate with a version of her dead father on a tropical beach in another galaxy to bring back the message that we humans are not alone. Katy Perry could never.

Interstellar - Another strangely hopeful tearjerker about space that features Matthew McConaughey. I am unashamed of my love of Nolan movies. It’s another score that instantly makes me well up. And again another film that feels oddly relevant to the world today. When Coop finds out the secret group he is meeting underground is the same NASA he flew for? You have to cry!!!!

Arrival - This one is newly in my plane cry rotation but stands just as strong as the others. While it feels like literally any man could have played Jeremy Renner’s role, Amy Adams is just so so good. And yes, again, the very real depiction of global division and violence are all too relevant when you’re on a flight in 2025. But the exploration of language, the bravery of a woman, the possibility of understanding time differently than the linear march forward we experience? It makes you feel more...what’s the word on the board? Human.

Yes they are all space movies. Yes they are basically all about the idea that we are not alone in the universe. Maybe that’s more understandable and emotional when you’re just slightly closer to the rest of space in a plane. But they all make great cries and none of them feature issues on a commercial airline on screen, which is a win.

And if you don’t want to cry, you can always watch Drop Dead Gorgeous. It didn’t age well, but what edgy comedy has??

MORE STUFF! MORE STUFF!
Add pepperoncini to more things! I’m on a real kick of them and the best is to add them to a chicken salad sandwich!!! TRY IT!

This month on Ruined we’re getting recs from our moms! My mom’s first choice is See No Evil! Listen now, and as always, two extra eps a month for $10 and up Patreon members.

The core crew of Welcome to Talk Town holds it down while Anthony is horizontal.

Me and Josh are hosting Sup Bro at Union Hall this Saturday 5/10 super last minute. Come see us and some funny pals. Or come to UH next Monday 5/19 when we host Frankenstein’s Baby.