Love can give you butterflies and lead to some quirky actions, like writing a love confession on a barf bag. Meet Andrea, whose in-flight note has the internet buzzing. While on a flight, she got so bored that she wrote a sweet confession, later found by an airline staff member who posted it online. The letter has since gone viral, and now strangers are on a mission to uncover the identity of her mystery crush.
Representative Image Source: Pexels | Olly
“If you’re reading this, hello! My name is Andrea and I am incredibly bored. Right now this flight is going from Miami to DC,” The passenger had scribbled in the note. “So, I bought the ticket last night at 4 am because I have a huge crush on my best friend. He’s flying from Boston to New Orleans and has a layover in DC.” She explained that since she lived in DC, she was anyway going to fly there, but since she was going to leave for Australia in four days for a semester abroad, this was urgent. She needed to get to the airport, surprise her man, and tell him that she had a crush on him.
Representative Image Source: Pexels | Gustavo Fring
“Bold move right? But see I’m going to Australia for a semester abroad in 4 days and I won’t see him for 5 months so it’s the last chance I have,” she wrote. “I don’t really know what I’m gonna say but I’m just gonna wing it. Why not I mean I’m leaving so who cares? I dunno man, wish me luck whoever you are.”
She explained that she was bored, her WiFi wasn’t working, and she was nervous, so writing the note seemed like a good idea. The caffeine from Starbucks didn’t help either. “Anyway, hope this has made your flight a little less boring,” she metaphorically sighed, ending the note with a heartfelt message, “Do me a favor and do something crazy today like I am. Good luck whoever you are.”
Image Source: Reddit | r/pics
Dated February 7, 2018, the note was written on an airline barf bag. The flight member who found it, u/ho_riene, posted snapshots of the note from the front and back sides and wrote, “Found this in the back pocket of a seat on an aircraft I was cleaning last year.” The post was shared in the r/pics group and has garnered over 50,000 upvotes and more than a thousand comments.
Image Source: Reddit | u/redaloevera
Andrea’s sweet confession note left people in suspense, eager to know what happened next, like a cliffhanger in a romantic movie. u/dailydoseoferik said that this seems “like the start of a rom-com.”
Image Source: Reddit | u/ripbum
Others turned into sleuths, trying to crack the mystery of who this woman Andrea is, and what happened to her love story. One of them, u/ostonero, pondered on two of her statements, analyzing them for timescale, “She says, ‘I actually live in DC and was gonna go up soon,’ but then says ‘I’m going to Australia for a semester abroad in 4 days.’ So when was she planning on going home?” u/dauphinbones guessed, “Maybe she was going home for a few days to pack for her abroad trip?”
Image Source: Reddit | u/ob1kunoli
Another detective, u/friedmackerel, reflected on Andrea’s statement about her going to an Australian university to study, analyzing several university programs available in Australia at that particular time. They also said, “Maybe Google combination of her name, university, and semester should provide a hit, guessing there won’t be many an Andrea from DC who went to these three institutes as a transfer student for that semester!”
Image Source: Reddit | u/pasthero
u/noeleraser recalled their own similar experience, “About 30 years ago, I did something similar. I wrote a letter on one of the pages of a magazine on the plane. I left my home address and several months later, someone took the time to write me and send me a letter. At the time I was a kid and it was one of the most exciting things that ever happened to me at the time.”
People are still seeking updates on Andrea, but none have surfaced yet. “I feel kind of cheated, knowing I’ll never know what happened with these two, it seems like a sweet love story but we’ll never know for sure,” said u/xool420.
Image Source: Reddit | u/atticus_trotting
u/ho_riene said she put the note back in the aircraft pocket and Redditors are hoping someone else will read it there. The mystery of the passenger's love interest hasn’t been solved yet, but as u/ho_riene said in the caption, “Wherever you are, I hope it went well for you.”
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Why do some folks use social media but don't engage?
Psychologist says people who never comment on social media share these 5 positive traits
For over 20 years, social media has developed into a staple in many people’s day-to-day lives. Whether it’s to keep in communication with friends and family, following the thoughts of celebrities, or watching cat videos while sipping your morning coffee, there seem to be two types of social media users: commenters and lurkers.
The term “lurker” sounds equally mysterious and insidious, with some social media users writing them off as non-participants at best or voyeurs at worst. However, mindfulness expert Lachlan Brown believes these non-commenters have some very psychologically positive and healthy traits. Let’s take a look at how each one of these traits could be beneficial and see how fruitful lurking might be even though it can drive content creators crazy.
1. Cautious about vulnerability
Consciously or not, making a post online or commenting on one puts you and your words out there. It’s a statement that everyone can see, even if it’s as simple as clicking “like.” Doing so opens yourself up to judgment, with all the good, bad, and potential misinterpretation that comes with it. Non-commenters would rather not open themselves up to that.
These silent users are connected to a concept of self-protection by simply not engaging. By just scrolling past posts or just reading/watching them without commentary, they’re preventing themselves from any downsides of sharing an opinion such as rejection, misunderstanding, or embarrassment. They also have more control on how much of themselves they’re willing to reveal to the general public, and tend to be more open face-to-face or during one-on-one/one-on-few private chats or DMs. This can be seen as a healthy boundary and prevents unnecessary exposure.
Considering many comment sections, especially involving political topics, are meant to stir negative emotional responses to increase engagement, being extra mindful about where, when, and what you comment might not be a bad idea. They might not even take the engagement bait at all. Or if they see a friend of theirs post something vulnerable, they feel more motivated to engage with them personally one-on-one rather than use social media to publicly check in on them.
2. Analytical and reflective mindset
How many times have you gone onto Reddit, YouTube, or any other site and just skimmed past comments that are just different versions of “yes, and,” “no, but,” or “yes, but”? Or the ever insightful, formerly popular comment “First!” in a thread? These silent browsers lean against adding to such noise unless they have some valid and thoughtful contribution (if they bother to comment period).
These non-posters are likely wired on reflective thinking rather than their initial intuition. Not to say that all those who comment aren’t thoughtful, but many tend to react quickly and comment based on their initial feelings rather than absorbing the information, thinking it over, researching or testing their belief, and then posting it. For "lurkers," it could by their very nature to just do all of that and not post it at all, or share their thoughts and findings privately with a friend. All in all, it’s a preference of substance over speed.
3. High sense of self-awareness
Carried over from the first two listed traits, these silent social media users incorporate their concern over their vulnerability and their reflective mindset into digital self-awareness. They know what triggers responses out of them and what causes them to engage in impulsive behavior. It could be that they have engaged with a troll in the past and felt foolish. Or that they just felt sad after a post or got into an unnecessary argument that impacted them offline. By knowing themselves and seeing what’s being discussed, they choose to weigh their words carefully or just not participate at all. It’s a form of self-preservation through restraint.
4. Prefer to observe rather than perform
Some folks treat social media as information, entertainment, or a mix of both, and commenting can feel like they’re yelling at the TV, clapping alone in a movie theater when the credits roll, or yelling “That’s not true!” to a news anchor that will never hear them. But contrary to that, social media is a place where those yells, claps, and accusations can be seen and get a response. By its design, social media is considered by experts and the media as performative, regardless of whether it is positive or negative. Taking all of the previously mentioned traits into account, one can see why they would prefer to “observe the play” rather than get up on the stage of Facebook or X.
On top of that, these non-commenters could be using social media differently than those who choose to fully engage with it. Using this type of navigation, there may be nothing for them to comment about. Some commenters are even vying for this for their mental health. There are articles about how to better curate your social media feeds and manipulate algorithms to create a better social media experience to avoid unnecessary conflict or mentally tiring debate.
If you go on a blocking spree on all of your accounts and just follow the posters that boost you, it could turn your social media into a nice part of your routine as you mainly engage with others face-to-face or privately. In terms of commenting, if your curated Instagram is just following cute dogs and all you have to offer for a comment is “cute dog,” you might just enjoy the picture and then move on with your day rather than join in the noise. These non-commenters aren’t in the show and they’re fine with it.
5. Less motivated by social validation
The last trait that Brown showcases is that social media users who browse without posting tend to be independent from external validation, at least online. Social media is built to grow through feedback loops such as awarding likes, shares, and reposts of your content along with notifications letting you know that a new person follows you or wants to connect. This can lead many people to connect their activity on social media with their sense of self worth, especially with adolescents who are still figuring out their place in the world and have still-developing brains.
Engaging in social media via likes, shares, comments, and posts rewards our brains by having them release dopamine, which makes us feel good and can easily become addictive. For whatever reason, non-commenters don’t rely on social media as a means to gauge their social capital or self worth. This doesn’t make them better than those who do. While some non-commenters could have healthier ways to boost their self worth or release dopamine into their systems, many get that validation from equally unhealthy sources offline. That said, many non-commenters’ silence could be a display of independence and self confidence.
Whether you frequently comment online or don’t, it’s good to understand why you do or don’t. Analyzing your habits can help you determine whether your online engagement is healthy, or needs to be tweaked. With that information, you can then create a healthy social media experience that works for you.