Unpopular opinion: Travel pillows should be banned

I have never trusted a travel pillow. It shows up as a helpful-looking crescent, then becomes a padded accusation. Put one round your neck and you have agreed to be gently restrained by luggage. I would sooner balance my head on a rolled-up timetable and accept whatever follows.

People say they are comfortable. That is technically true, in the way a cupboard is comfortable for a sufficiently small moth. The pillow bargains with your neck. It presses at the front, then the sides. One memorable specimen went straight for my chin, apparently keen to remind me that I had made poor decisions before boarding.

That pressure has consequences. I once watched a travel pillow drop from an empty seat in Lower Wombley and land upright. Nothing about it was embarrassed. There it stood, ring-shaped and smug, declining to account for itself. I asked the carriage attendant whether it had a ticket. She said it had been travelling since breakfast and had already missed two connections.

“It stood there, ring-shaped and smug, refusing to explain itself.” — The Minister for Soft Edges, Quibbleton Parch

Even the authorities have joined in. The Department of Neckless Comfort says, through its Minister for Soft Edges, Quibbleton Parch, that these pillows create a private border between passengers and the outside world. I reject this. The outside world has made no attempt on my neck. The pillow has. It has erected a tiny frontier and now collects rent in shoulder stiffness.

Then there is the horseshoe argument. A horseshoe is practical too. Nobody fastens one to their face before a three-hour journey and describes the result as relaxation. A useful pillow would resemble a modest cushion, perhaps a supportive cloud with handles. This one resembles a question mark. Fair enough.

The matter is also personal. Travel pillows make me look prepared, which is a serious misrepresentation. I am the person who forgot a pen, boarded from the wrong platform, and packed one sock with a decorative tassel. The pillow raises expectations I cannot meet. People see it and assume I understand lumbar alignment. I am usually eating crackers over a folded receipt.

So I propose an immediate ban. Decorative pillows may remain on shelves, where they can be admired from a safe distance. Quibbleton Parch will call that extreme. I call it proportionate. Until travel pillows support a head without closing around the face like a polite foam trap, I will travel awake, irritable, and against the window, with the dignity of a disappointed pigeon.