Words from Dic(tionary)

Aisle: (n) a passage between rows of seats in a building such as a church or theater, an airplane or a train: e.g. the show had the audience dancing in the aisle.

I shall use the airplane as my example. It happens in three phases.

As an adult male, I have approximately a forty-five pound ratio of wiggle in my room. What I mean by that is that sometimes my girth will soar–if that’s possible–to forty-five pounds heavier. And on other occasions I will drop that forty-five pounds, reaching my more svelte.

As you can imagine, in most intervals, I hover between.

I can tell where I am in the various phases of my evolution by walking down the aisle in an airplane. If I am peaking, I must perform the task sliding completely sideways. If I am in my lean and keen phase, I can stand and walk completely upright, facing forward, without carrying other people’s newspapers with me along the way. If I land between the two conditions, I can move forward a few feet before a buttock will catch on a seat, demanding that I shake and rattle my way free before proceeding forward.

It is a marvelous test to determine my progress or regression–perhaps even more effective than weighing on a scale.

It is the “aisle test.”

And I’ll say … preferable.