Thoughts from 26,000 feet

25. February 2010 by Sherri.

Tiny snowflakes glittered in the street light as they silently floated to the ground.  For a moment, it felt like I was in a snow globe.  The cold seeped through my jacket as I heaved my suitcase and bag into the backseat of the car.  I’m regretting that extra suit already, I thought to myself.  “When will I learn to travel light?”  It got worse when I arrived at the airport.  Instead of a jet way, the gate was at ground level.  Juggling a very hot cup of coffee, I tried to push my bags onto the escalator, but the corner caught on the side and almost pulled me down.  “There’s an elevator over there, if that would be easier for you” an airport employee yelled.  Mortified, I backed up and headed for the elevator.  When will I get the message – too much stuff is a pain.  I long to travel light. My problem is I am indecisive.  “A girl likes to have choices,” I justify to myself.  But the choices are weighing me down, causing me to falter, to be off balance.  I need to learn to let go, to make the best of what I’ve got.  I need to learn to travel lightly.

The airplane pierced the heavy winter clouds just as the sun began to rise.  The midnight blue sky, adorned with a crescent moon, gave way to lighter shades of blue, until just at the horizon, a thin line of peach and pink light appeared.  Gradually, a brilliant golden sun floated into sight.  It was brilliant, so bright I had to close my eyes, and even through my eyelids, I could see the light of the sun.  “I wonder if my skin makes vitamin D through the window of an airplane.” I thought to myself.  The intensity of the light hurt my eyes, but I couldn’t bear to close the shade on the window. Sunlight is too precious a commodity to a northerner like me. 

As I type, the sun refracted through the diamond on my finger makes tiny rainbows dance on the side of the plane.  They flit about like the snowflakes I saw earlier. But these “snowflakes” are not governed by the gravity of the earth, but by the movement of my hands.  Gravity. Something I always tend to think about when I’m 26,000 feet above the earth.  I once was told that planes don’t just fall out of the sky – that even in severe conditions the have the ability to glide for a while, especially from this height. That was before flight 3407 fell out of the sky onto a house in Clarence, taking with it 51 people, among them Gerry Niewood, a fabulous saxophone player, one of the heroes of my youth and Cantor Susan Wehle, a woman I heard sing at a funeral just a few weeks before.  I know I stand a better chance of dying in a car than a plane - Still, I am a nervous flyer.  I never used to be.  I used to love the excitement of it, the rush of takeoff, the fun of looking out the window.  But I had a bad flight once, and it has stuck with me.  And I don’t  like the way my insides feel when I fly, all nervous and shaky, like my heart knows that my body is going 600 miles an hour, even if the rest of me doesn’t.  I like to be on the ground, in control.  Yet, even when I am in control, I over pack.  I bring more clothes than I need, more books than I can possibly read.  I’m just kidding myself if I think I am in control.

I think of those people who ended up in the Hudson River last year.  I wonder how they felt, if they really had time to process what was happening.  Many people said they prayed as the plane went  down.  I wonder if they felt a sense of God’s presence with them in those moments, and in the minutes afterward, as they waded out onto the plane’s wings and waited to be plucked up by a rescue boat.  I wonder how many of them have prayed since?  Where they prayers of gratitude?  Will they be moved to pray again, even in less dramatic situations?   I always pray on airplanes.  Mostly to find a calm place within God, reminding myself that no matter what happens this day, God is with me.  Hopefully we don’t have to wait for a disaster to turn to God.  Snowflakes, glittering in streetlights, point to God, the sun rising on another day, points to God, light dancing through the ring my beloved gave me as a token of his love, points to God.  And while I may not be in control, God is.

Posted in Uncategorized | 199 Comments »