Well, here I am. Obviously I survived the flights home, though how I did that I am not entirely sure. We had some crazy turbulence, and I spent a lot of time praying, eyes shut tight, hands gripping the seats so hard my fingers hurt. Luckily, I couldn't completely loose myself in that fear, because I had Parker there, who was unsettled when I was unsettled. There was much nervous laughter on my part, but we all survived.
And, I conquered a fear! If you remember, in a recent blog about my plane fears, I shared that I don't move once I am on the plane for fear that my movement will unbalance the plane and send us all crashing towards the Earth. Because of this, I haven't used the rest room in a plane since I was a very little girl and far too young to understand the dangers of air travel. It appears that God decided to test that theory while on the smallest plane flying out of Dayton yesterday. (Which still wasn't as small as the prop plane I took to Witchita Falls several years ago. It didn't even have a bathroom.) After several orange juices, I found myself in desperate need of some relief, and some courage. It was almost a 3 hour flight, and we weren't even half way through yet, so the choices were limited to either standing up and walking to the back of the plane to brave the potty or wetting myself without a change of clothes on hand.
I seriously considered the second option for several minutes.
Imagine my shock when I found myself unbuckling my seat belt and standing in the foot wide aisle, making my teetering way back towards the 15 inch wide door at the back of the plane! Now, call my crazy if you wish, but I can feel the vast amount of space that is underneath me when I am on a plane, and it has always been a very strange feeling. It is worse when you're walking over it, aware that the only thing between you and that immense amount of empty space is a small cargo bay with some scattered luggage.
Once through the door I found myself in the smallest, noisiest, most frightening bathroom I had ever imagined. Every second I was sitting there I was convinced that the bolts holding the toilet seat in were going to looses, allowing the toilet, it's contents, and myself to fall through the air to the Earth below...fear does not have to be rational...but somehow I survived! It was a proud woman who made her way back to her seat (I smacked a guy in the head with my boobs as I was coming out of the bathroom...there was really such little room and they are so very large...) and buckled herself back in!
I also have proof that God has a sense of humor...and all this happened in one day!
I have often said, not entirely joking, that the only way planes could be worse for me is if the crew consisted of giant spiders. No, the crew of my plane was not made up if over sized arachnids, but there was too much irony in the situation not to find it amusing.
Our second plane had little screens that lowered from the ceiling on which they were showing these beautiful nature shows! I didn't have my headphones, but I was watching the shows for the beautiful images and to keep my mind off of the terrible turbulence. I am assuming if I had been privileged enough to hear what the narrator was saying I would have realized that they were shifting topics on this particular documentary...all I know is that one second I was fascinated by the images of underwater volcanoes and running lava under the ocean, and the next second I was staring into the multiple eyes of a huge spider, made larger by the amazing zoom lenses of the camera men.
It was close enough to count the individual hairs on it's many legs, and even had it not been zoomed in upon to such a disgusting level, it was a huge spider by any standard! I looked away as fast as I could and started giggling, half way between hysterics and genuine amusement that they very thing I had said could make a flight worse for me was happening. Michael laughed himself, and took great delight in narrating the eating and hunting habits of our large arachnid friend until it was again safe for me to watch. Overall, it was highly amusing, and reminds me that God Himself must have a sense of humor.
I suppose I have rambled enough, and I have several thousand pictures to go through in the next couple of days. I will post some as soon as they are ready.
God bless and thank you for reading!
2 comments:
Glad to hear you made it back. You are better than me. I wouldn't be able to do it.
Hahaha, oh my...that sounds like quite an interesting journey! I am thankful that you all survived the flight and that the giant arachnids were not, in fact, the flight crew.
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