Let us look at airplane seating arrangements. Seats are narrower than they were 10 years ago. Rows of seats are crammed so close there is little knee room. The length of my body from tailbone to kneebone is about 21 inches. On international flights my knees are within five inches of the seat in front of me. Very few of my seatmates ever had that luxury. They endure cramping or punish the forward passenger with constant jabbing to the kidneys. When the seat in front of me is pushed back for the passenger to relax, I have a tray table so close I cannot lay my head down to relieve my tortured spine.

Let us look at airline seats. Seat designs have changed little in the 30 years I've flown. Where are innovative seat designers? Seat manufacturers and installers offer outmoded seats and seating arrangements. Should passengers be seated as if they are looking at a concert or stage play? All things considered a very small design change might require some impossible accommodations in individual air and lighting. But we can't throw out the old engineers and create new ones, although for real change that might be the final answer.

Let us look at service. Flight attendants, pilots, and airport personnel are always helpful and mostly pleasant. Each can have pinched toes or pinched relationships that cause isolated tantrums but in my over a million miles of flying unpleasant incidents have been so rare as to be forgotten. Personnel attitude and actions are exemplary.

Let us look at destinations. Getting where we're going is pretty darned good. Thirty years ago I often had to dash from the far end of one concourse to the farther end of another in very few minutes. As long as I stick to one airline for each trip the gate of connecting flight is never far away. The time allowed between flights is long enough to allow a potty break as well as a comfortable walk to the next gate. The chances of lost luggage are less as well.

Let us look at food service. What a change from full dinner service to a light snack on flights of less than four hours. Much of the full meals that didn't get into our laps went into the garbage mostly because we didn't have space to exercise decent table manners. Choice of drinks is necessary, I think, although the wide variety could eventually be limited. Water is offered which rarely happened 10 years ago.

Let us look at passengers. The average circumference of passengers has grown tremendously and I do not use that adjective lightly. The snack food industry does a fantastic job of marketing. The slogan "You can't stop with just one" is not based on a taste factor. Nor is it based on oral satisfaction carried over from infancy. It is based on chemistry of hunger symptoms and used effectively. So we eat and eat and eat. More than a tremendous will power is needed to reverse thinking that we constantly need to eat. That creates a dilemma unforeseen in seating design. No longer is a standard 18 inch seat enough for overweight bodies. British Airways caters to Asian passengers and Asians, so far, remain shorter and lighter than American tourists. But they do not outnumber larger tourists on international flights beyond Heathrow.

Let us look at solutions. I hope airlines can survive without total government subsidies. Passenger comfort will not be considered unless survival comes from happy users not from ill-gotten dollars. Flying is so far the only way to get from home to distant parts of the globe. I want the industry to continue and flourish. I expect more comfortable seating. I even expect some solution to the destruction of the ozone layer from the enormous amounts of airline fuel expended in just one of my flights. Solutions can only come from creative brains that reside in human bodies. So much has been accomplished in one century. The right goals and visions can get us even farther. I want to live to see those days.