Bright Side

Shiprock, NM

Normally when your flight gets delayed by five hours there isn't much you can do about it.  Our flight was delayed by a mechanical problem.  That meant we would miss our connection and would to end up spending the night either in San Jose, where our flight originated from, or Dallas / Fort Worth.  We were on business travel and while the thought of staying and exploring the mountains for an extra day was appealing, getting home 15 hours behind schedule was better then 22 hours behind schedule.  We opted to jump halfway and spend the night in Dallas, since it was halfway home.    

Life is an adventure, right?   Try to look on the bright side?  Sure why not.  You have to try.

The airline flew in another plane, so we were not taking the plane with the mechanical problem.  Worry number one taken care of.  Second, we scored exit row seats on both new flights.  Leg room is always a good thing on a full flight, which on the second leg was sure to be the case.  Third, only 35 of the original 135 passengers stuck with the flight to Dallas.  We averaged less than one person per row on the flight.

Flying from San Jose to Dallas / Fort Worth means we flew over some of the best geology the country has to offer, the southern part of the Rocky Mountains, including Four Corners.  Flying over the Rockys on a delayed flight meant that the setting sun highlighted the topography in a spectacular fashion. And I had a window seat.

Most of you know I'm a geologist.  Rocks are my "thing".  The few times I've flown west I've sat with my face plastered to the window watching the landscape pass by. This flight was no different.  Only this time, there were a lot of windows with no one sitting next to them.  

I felt like a kid in a candy shop.  For about 30 minutes I bounced from one side of the plane to the other, empty row to empty row, a few rows forward, a few back.  First snow capped peaks on the right side.  Incised rivers valleys on the left.  Half Dome in Yosemite.  Ooo!  Is that El Capitan?  The Grand Canyon in the distance?  The pilot kindly called out Shiprock, with a wonderfully long shadow and a tripod of resistant minette "legs" radiating out from the central volcanic pipe. A site to die for... if you are a geologist at 32,000 feet.

After a while the sun had set at ground level.  The ground lay in a muted shadow, with the details having faded from sight, while we watched a fiery sun slip below the horizon with too much haze, even at that height, for a green flash.  

The sky to the west slipped from orange to red to indigo, colors you only see in the clear sky from a plane, before fading to black.  In the distance, off to the east, there were thunderheads putting on a light show that my little Canon camera just didn't have the power to capture.  Above us, Sagittarius sparkled brightly in a clearly visible Milky Way.   

So I sat, sipping a Chardonnay, because the airline wasn't charging for snacks or drinks on the flight, and enjoyed the view.  As we drew closer to Dallas, the lights of Austin shone in the distance to one side, while more thunderstorms flashed off the other.  It hadn't been a bad flight, even for being delayed for five hours.  What else could I do but sit with my face plastered against the window, look for, and find, the bright side in the dark sky beyond.