For years my best friend has given me grief over my tendency to put my nose in a book the second I get on a plane. She's always asking me if I talked to anyone and I'm always rolling my eyes and saying 'do you know me at all?' But I have to say, in the past couple years I've started having short chats with my seat-mates and I've run into all kinds of interesting folks.

Like the woman I just sat next to. She was reading a book entitled something like "How to Communicate with the Spirit World for Dummies." I peeked a couple times and saw topics like "how to prepare for the afterlife" which said something about getting your "energy" right, as well as definitions for seance <sp?>, trance, medium and etc.

I was wracking my brain for a conversation starter when she snickered at me as I tried to cut a string with my teeth. I was sewing but I'd had to leave my reliable scissors back home with Bertha. She dug through her purse and found a plastic knife she'd brought to eat her chicken salad -- unfortunately I couldn't get the knife to work so I was back to square one.

But we did have a few sporadic chats over the hour and a half flight. I found out she's writing a biography of a medium and that's why she was reading the "Dummies" book. She'd come across the medium when trying to contact a family member and that's how she knew this lady was "the real deal." Before I could think of anything to say to that she put headphones on and napped for the rest of the flight. I prayed for her and gave her a copy of my book as we got off the plane -- maybe she'll read it and hear something different.