I recently did a couple of trips worth of travelling all by my lonesome. This was my first time doing so, so I was honestly pretty terrified. So many things could go wrong while you are nowhere near you safe places. You could miss your flight, lose your luggage, get mugged, get marked as a terrorist, get kidnapped or even be killed.

My anxiety riddled mind certainly made the experience much more difficult to deal with. I found comfort, however, in knowing that I was not alone in being alone.

At my first solo gate, I picked out a seat near a woman who appeared rather maternal to me. This was a conscious decision on my part as I felt safe near a woman like her. I then began to notice that other lone women and even families seemed to do the same thing. There were a couple of teenage girls who sat across from me, and soon there seemed to be a clear divide between the groups of women, lone women, the families, the men and couples. I pondered whether it was intentional or instead instinctual.

When I got on the plane, I was filled with dread when I found that my seat was a window seat and only the middle seat was open, putting me between two burly men. I reluctantly squeezed past the first and tried to get comfortable. This was a nightmare turn of events for me--I have claustrophobia and social anxiety. The thought occurred to me that I was uncomfortable because they were men and I am almost completely sure that that was a part of it.

Come to find out, I sat down in the wrong aisle and I was actually in the aisle behind us. The numbers weren't directly over the seats, so I made a simple mistake and moved to my correct seat promptly. I found that my window seat was actually one in an aisle with only one other person. She was middle aged with an interesting European accent of some kind and she immediately struck up a friendly conversation. I reciprocated for about ten minutes and then we left each other alone for the remaining five hours.

I was completely comfortable in this seat and it really made me take a moment to contemplate why exactly I was happier with it. I truly feel that a lot of it had to do with being uncomfortable around the men because I was alone. If just one other person had been travelling with me, I would not have noticed who was around me.

Now, are we actually safe when we make these unconscious decisions? I would say not. While we may feel safe when we sit near a woman and away from people who appear threatening to us, the person we think seems good may end up more dangerous than the "type" of person we were trying to avoid.

To actually be safe, we must remain vigilant, never leave our things unattended and make friends with stewards(esses), all while having a clear game plan in our heads to avoid the avoidable issues that might have occurred otherwise.