There is weather on the ground at my destination, so we are circling somewhere above the clouds and my place of safety. My emotions are circling around exhaustion and fear. I want the plane to land so I can feel safe, so I can head to my place of quiet and calm.
I have a friend who loves living in the sky, who would tell me that this is simply a time to relax and trust. And yet I am not a creature of the air, I am made of fire and water. The sea is my home, not the sky. My life is in the hands of unknown updrafts and turbulent winds. I wonder if the ground is pounded, if my car and home are safe. If I am safe.
I want to quietly cry as old fears breakthrough the boundaries of time and space. I wish I could reach out across the wild sky to arms and hands and voices that would comfort me. But I am circling around in the clouds and the vacuous air, knowing the science of staying afloat, but not trusting the air to lift these metal wings.
What is it about being surrounded by emptiness that awakens ancient loneliness inside me? Why does the shaking of the plane shake lose old wounds and fears? In truth, spiraling is a chance to see life from a different elevation, to trust that the past is place I do not need to visit. And that wings are simply sails that lift me across the sea. To understand that life’s turbulence like ocean waves and tides and ripples, are a type of song. I am not afraid of flying, but of circling around chances not taken, roads not traveled, a life not fully lived. And that realization breaks the grip of fear, allowing me to breath until the weather moves on and the earth welcomes us home.
I had the same experience on a circling airplane and had to calm myself down. I love how you handled this.