A warning is something that we must all be aware of in order to live. A fair warning is not always given in different circumstances. Being able to detect when something will happen is a skill any human can detect when having the correct experience in a certain condition, or matter at hand. The brain knows when to alert our senses and lets us know when to not complete an action so we do not put ourselves in any danger or harm. The brain will also let us know when there is a sensation and when to proceed our movement towards what is generating such a great vibe. People also have this same feeling when they are talking to a significant other, or a new person they have never seen, or met, before. What the brain does in situations like these is to let people know what they should say about to someone. It also lets us know when we should refrain from saying something that may potentially hurt someone else. In the story “The Girl on the Plane”, there are a few concepts from the reading and text that is able to be pulled from it. This is a very difficult text to break down and pull a meaning from, meaning, the story itself. In the story it is easy to see a great amount of loss vining off, and reflecting through, the memories of the main character in the short story. John Morton is also able to present another concept that is able to be pulled from this short story. That is his security, or for by any other way we lose our security and our foundation while in a conversation with someone. 

Losing anything is a tough situation for any individual to go through, no matter who or what it was taken away from them. Most people, at some point in their lives, have all encountered some kind of loss within their lifetime. These losses that are encountered can have permanent effects on how a person goes about living their live, and how they perceive future understanding. One example of this situation could be people being separated. “Whether you are divorcing or just breaking up with a partner, separating is a unique moment in time that can alter the rest of your life or theirs” (Lowrance). How the person reacts is the biggest problem that a lot people face as they grow older and are finally able to understand the meaning behind what really happened. Once they realize that, they have to be able to move on after they have had an emotional turmoil within themselves. How someone continues to live their life is what makes the difference. Between what they left behind and what they had walk away from, that is a key life changer. In the story “The Girl on the Plane”, it also goes through a lot of flash backs of John Morton. Mary Gaitskill really liked to mess with John Morton’s head and have him go back in forth between the present world, his fantasies, memories, and day dreams. Throughout the short story, John Morton would have flash backs of a lot of his previous relationships, whether they were in high school or in college. Every single loss of a girlfriend, which are now his long lost ex’s, are having a very significant impact on his life, all in this one moment of the story were he must speak to a girl next to him on a plane. This girl does not have a clue about John Morton’s past and neither had to know, or much less even cared to know about everything John Morton has gone through to reach the moment in time to encounter her presence. Not a lot was known about John Morton starting off the story. Mary Gaitskill did a fantastic job on keeping the reader in the dark and letting them get to know John Morton just the same as the Girl on the plane did. Starting at the beginning of the story, nobody knew that John Morton had been through hell and back with his previous relationships. They also did not know about the many encounters he had and how much he had sex with these previous girlfriends, and even weirder to say, his friends as well. Sex had been a big topic that was brought up very often in the day dreams, or memories of his. When you have sex with someone, that memory is always burned into your mind and you cannot get rid of it. Every time you think about doing it again or think of sex at all, you will always think of the previous encounter you had, and Mary Gaitskill did this the same way with John Morton and when he was talking to the Girl. He would always flash back to an old girl that meant a lot to him. Throughout the story, John would be engaging in a conversation with the girl on the plane. This girls name was Lorraine. Lorraine and John would carry on in conversation and as soon as something was brought up or mentioned about a female of his past or about his previous relationships, it would shoot straight to a flash back of an encounter he had had with his ex-girlfriends.

Each girl had something significantly different about them. Each one of the girls that John Morton had dated had a much different back story than the rest did. This meant that Mary Gaitskill took the time into forming each ex to be a big part of John’s life. It really adds deeper meaning to the whole concept of losing something. The story had opened the reader to knowing that John Morton was indeed married to a wife at the beginning of the story. They inform the reader of this when the story mentioned that he had remembered something his wife had read in a magazine about how being tardy to getting on planes could lead to depression and could also mean that someone really does not care about their job. This all leads into how he treats the girl that got on the plane next to him. The first girl in his loss for memories, and his loss for love in the world is going out to his first girlfriend Andrea, whom he met in college. All of his girlfriends are just being brought up because the girl next to him, Lorraine, is always questioning him which is bringing up his past with the girlfriends he has had. Everything she brings up is weird to him. The things she talks to him about in the story are indeed relevant to the story. They just don't exactly make sense to the reader at first. Mary Gaitskill introduces this short story to the readers in a way that uses this strategy of losing something in John Morton and it is very smart in the way that she did it. The story would continue to go on and she would soon have Lorraine tell the reader what it is she does and where she comes from. It even describes a little more of her own personal background. This is definitely a good thing to do as all the girls come into play and tell us a little more about John each time a memory of that specific girl pops into his head. Continuing on the concept of loss, in the story we soon see that John is communicating with Lorraine in more depth than he originally had been. She tells the readers and John a little more about herself with each question John forces upon her. The reason it seems like he forced them upon her is because a lot of the questions he asks her are not the most pleasant and they could have been deemed not very formal in a conversation. This could be very valuable information because even though he is only asking questions, he is also thinking about if she is single or if she is married and a lot of other great things that are soon after brought up in the story. There is one girl in particular that is eventually always popping up throughout the story. This girl is the person John Morton felt closet to besides with his wife. It is quite wonderful to think about how this has all come to be and how it has shaped John Morton more as a person than it probably should have. This just backs up even more information on these situations and proves that the past really can significantly change how a human can move onward in life and expose the inner things that truly torment us deep down in the inter rims of our existence. The story continues on and a single girl is coming to John Morton’s mind a lot more than any other. That girl happens to be one of his closest friends he had in college, Patty LaForge. This girl has a very strong grip over John Morton’s life. It is the difference between him getting his life up to speed and not having random flashbacks of why each one of these girls, specifically the girl on the plane, reminds him so much of Patty. He is always going back and thinking about the times that he had with her. This really opens up John Morton’s past to the readers and to the girl sitting next to him on the plane. This leads up to some things being said that should be an alarming warning. 

Your body is an amazing instrument that is used to help us function in life to the fullest of our ability. It comes with pleasure and senses which John Morton soon tells the readers and Lorraine. By doing this, he gets himself into a big mess. It is also a setup in the human brain system to help us know when something wrong or bad is about to happen. We also have a storage compartment in our brain that processes unbelievable amounts of data. It also contains another compartment where the brain can be filled with pointless things we do not have to know. Another thing the brain can do is be filled with very important information about yourself that should probably be kept to yourself. “A study in Science in May bolsters the claim that awareness emerges when information travels back and forth between brain areas rather than from ascending a linear chain of command” (Peck). This is the information that is crucial to keeping only to yourself, unless you really trust someone or in other cases, someone who you absolutely love that will still like you after you tell this part about you to them. The girl on the plane is someone that should have produced a warning in the human brain system to not tell her. The thing he told her was that he was an alcoholic, which is not that bad compared to what he says later. John Morton shows the reader a great way of how people let their guards down too easily. People have to hold the important things about themselves inside. If you notice the way John Morton talks to Lorraine, he seems very open when he tells her about everything he has done. It must mean that Mary Gaitskill is trying to let the reader know that he does feel very comfortable around this girl because she reminds him so much of his ex’s. This makes him feel like he is in a secure, safe zone with her. The facts that we pull from his memories of other girls just come to show how he will be with Lorraine if it reminds him of Patty. This unfortunately makes him open up to her way too easily. Doing this allows her to see what kind of a man he truly is and to show that he is not afraid to tell anyone that he is an alcoholic, which is very defining of someone. This is very bold by Mary Gaitskill because she is trying to help others in the world to also realize that it is possible to open to others but only if you feel comfortable. Do not go around saying things that are very deep and personal about you to just anyone though. That is not the way to go with it. All people have things about themselves that they feel very insecure about. Being concerned about their own status and how people look at them is also not a bad thing. People are just trying to fit in, when in fact they do not fit in at all. Nobody is close to what they want to be and they are nowhere close to what they could potentially reach during their life. It is catastrophic what someone could do to another if the security network to their life was destroyed. John Morton did something, and in this case, said something that completely killed his chances to talk to Lorraine or even make it possible to get to know her. If he told anybody this deep secret that he has, and the problem is he told a random woman on a plane next to him, this this could get back to somebody really easily that he would not want this information getting to. John Morton apparently was arrested for raping his best friend Patty LaForge, and he was not the only one either. John Morton also confesses for no reason to Lorraine that he is an alcoholic, or was one. "’How come you told me that about yourself? It seems kind of personal.’ He attached his gaze to hers as he said this; ‘sometimes women said personal things to you as a way of coming on’” (Gaitskill). Throughout the story, Mary Gaitskill tells us about John Morton’s past and memorial moments that he had held with Patty. They were at a party and he was not too drunk but he saw Patty there as well. She stumbled over and confessed to him while she was drunk that she wanted to have sex with him. John refused and soon after she ended up heading into a room. The room was full of other guys and this is considered a gang rape. John saw that she was too drunk to probably do anything, but he joined with the other guys and continued to have sex with her just like everyone else did. John Morton really liked Patty LaForge and having sex with her at the time was not bad and he deemed it reasonable to do at that moment. John was very wrong for what he did. He was arrested, and when he was arrested was charged with rape.  This is something that he has to live with the rest of his life and will continue to stick with him. Being charged with something like that is not exactly something he ought to be proud. He especially should not feel like he has to tell anyone he does not know. John Morton, with no hesitation as the plane landed, proceeded to tell the girl on the plane next to him, Lorraine, that he had raped a girl before. "’If you want to talk about mistakes-shit, I raped somebody. Somebody I liked.’ Their gaze met in a conflagration of reaction. She was so close he could smell her sweating, but at the speed of light she was falling away, deep into herself where he couldn't follow. She was struggling to free her hand” (Gaitskill). John tried to clear up exactly what he had just said to her, but he did a very poor job of it. This completely scared away Lorraine and she scurried off the plane as fast as she could. She was disgusted with what had just happened, and how the conversations went on the plane ride. Everything she knew about John Morton went out the door and all she could focus on was that he had raped a girl. This was very tragic, but the part of mind that is supposed to tell you that this should not be done did not kick in to help John Morton out. People are to help open up their securities and become a little more vulnerable, but to the extent that they will always ruin their own individual self-image. This is just tragic on how the short story ended. 

The short story of, “The Girl on the Plane”, is a very good source of how a person’s losses in the past can greatly impact one’s future. People should be aware of their surroundings and understand the situations that they are placed into. They should also know what they should say and tell others about themselves. They must know the balance between sharing things with others about themselves and knowing what they should not tell others that do not personally know them. People need to look at what they have done and what they have lost and look to make sure this does not have a major impact on how they live their life. They should know their personal boundaries, that way they are not always open and free to everyone. This was a short story about someone opening up too much and blowing their own securities and going a little too far. People need to learn that they are not be like this and they need to be careful of how much they really open up to others that they do not know. 
