I normally sleep while traveling on a plane. I can be fast asleep within minutes of finding my seat, getting situated and then fastening my seat belt to ensure that my slumber is not interrupted by a diligent flight attendant. The chaos that is our modern airport, largely made up by an aloof and entitled citizenry and the unchecked empowerment of the TSA officers, is enough to send my anxiety into overdrive which drains my body but makes for easy sleeping, however exhausting it may be. Once I successfully (and finally) make it through security I find a spot at one of the bars located at the departure gates to order a pre-flight whiskey. Something at least 100 proof to guarantee me that I will get my money’s worth and will provide the most medicinal benefit. I consider this whiskey more than a consolation prize for once again surviving the dreaded security screening process, it is my trophy for navigating the invasive treatment and making it to the other side.

This flight was different. For perhaps the first time I did not sleep on the plane. The Wild Turkey 101 certainly hit the spot wonderfully just like it was supposed to do and I felt relaxed, but I was not interested to mentally remove myself from the confines of the small seat with no leg room on a metal cylinder with windows and too many people as I am normally accustomed to doing. I was happy to just be there, to actually participate in the air travel experience awake. This may not have been the best flight to try out this new directive. I like the fact that I can make a long flight seem very short simply by sleeping through most of it. As soon as we were all boarded the captain announced that the control tower had closed the ramp due to lightning. Not all of the luggage had been loaded yet so we would have to sit at the gate for an undetermined amount of time until the threat had subsided and the rampers could continue on with their duties so that all the bags were loaded. I sat and stared out the window watching the rain fall and studying the ominous black cloud in the distance over the city of Denver. The black cloud that shot lighting out of its belly in such a manner that it seemed angry to me or perhaps like a child throwing a temper tantrum. The storm did not last long and soon I could hear the bags being loaded beneath me. “We should be on our way soon” I thought to myself. The captain appeared again on the tiny speakers located through out the plane to announce that we were back in the game and were about to taxi onto the runway, with one caveat. Due to the extensive delay there were now sixty planes in que to use two runways. I felt very thankful that we were number fifteen in line. Even so, it would be a while before we would take off but we were not number sixty. I felt badly for those poor souls on whatever plane that was.

Once I became bored peering out the small window at scenery that never changed, which was now obscured by the rain drops that had collected on it, I escaped to the book that I am currently reading, “Cutting For Stone” by Abraham Verghese. I was much more interested to catch back up with Shiva, Marion, Hema and Ghosh who were all now my new friends in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, rather than sleep. In between chapters I would look out of the window. I noticed how the light changed and how the glimmer of the sun eventually faded from the wing of the plane as the sun set and we traveled into nightfall at five hundred miles per hour. The moon became brighter and traveled along with us for the entire trip. I watched its static position just above the wing tip, refusing to move even the slightest bit as we traveled just over sixteen hundred miles to our final destination. I took photographs of it using the camera on my phone for no other purpose but to document the movement of the light. It was the golden hour, the holy grail of light for landscape photographers and somehow it was just as beautiful thirty two thousand feet in the air with clouds and the slight curvature of the horizon serving as the only landscape subject matter. Satisfied that I had completed the all important meaningless masterpiece/ photo-documentary of changing light, I returned to my book with much less digital storage space on my phone.

The Army of Ethiopia had regained power over the Imperial Bodyguard and General Mebratu had just been hung as punishment for his failed coup attempt against the Emperor King Hallie Selassie. My eyes grew tired when I realized that I was now half way through my book. My attention drifted to the window that was now black as night. I pressed my face against it in an attempt to see the stars with little luck. I thought that I would try to put my phone flat against the pane to see if a photograph would somehow magically capture the stars for me to see. While it did capture the stars, the horizon line and the lights from the clusters of civilization below, it captured something far more beautiful than that. In a manner that reminded me of the double exposure technique that I used to use with film cameras, the photograph that I made captured the image of my wife sitting in an aisle seat across from me reading her book. This wonderful, beautiful creature, whom is the love of my life sits only feet from me while simultaneously floating amongst the stars like an angel overseeing the earth below. The captain reappeared, his voice announcing our approach and instructing the flight crew to prepare for landing. This flight was indeed different and I was thankful for my new awakened experience. I think that I will try it again in a few months.