LHR-FRA

Our Lufthansa flight from Heathrow to Frankfurt was delayed several times.  Nobody cares to hear the details of flight delays, especially during a pandemic when it’s socially reprehensible for some to even consider travelling.  On Twitter, a Canadian doctor has slammed people complaining about flight problems, when others don’t have their health needs met: a strawman argument.  I’m always perplexed by arguments such as these that don’t state the threshold for when it would become acceptable: would the health needs include other countries, or just their own?  I went through Med School learning about Malaria and TB as things Australians didn’t need to worry much about but other humans had to.  Nobody suggested that I couldn’t fly anywhere until those diseases were cured. Entertainingly, people that know how to search past tweets were quick to post 7-year-old tweets that showed the original poster had not previously been so absolute and binary in their opinions on air travel and relatively minor inconveniences as being something mutually exclusive to caring about the health of others.  

There were many aircraft in queue at Heathrow waiting to take-off.  I was amazed at how relaxed it all seemed from my window seat over the wing.  I wondered what the pilots were hearing though, as when we went to Kununnurra and flew in tiny aircraft we were allowed to hear the back-and-forth between pilots and control.  Those clouds were a bit of a turbulent patch of sky.  What height does sky begin?  Is it when you pass through a cloud? We’re now above two levels of clouds, the lower level is fluffy, like non-mass enhancement on breast MRI showing ductal carcinoma in situ.  The higher layer is more flat, like invasive lobular carcinoma on a mammogram.  It’s been four weeks now since I’ve been on vacation and I’ve stopped seeing breast cancers on screening mammography when I close my eyes.  

Many people on this flight have missed connections due to the delay.  We had a moment of mild stress earlier when we wondered if our flight would be cancelled and we’d have to leave the airport for a hotel for the night.  I felt like we were back in our cabin on the MS Roald Amundsen in March 2020 at the start of the pandemic and I was desperately trying to book new flights from Santiago to Australia, anywhere in Australia, just to get home.  I’m so glad I waited until we were actually off the ship before clicking, “Pay,” otherwise I would’ve wasted thousands more dollars on flights that we’d never catch that might never be refunded.

I forgot to pack snacks in my backpack; I was so excited to eat fresh berries this past week in the UK that I’ve got nothing for emergency food in my backpack.  I’m not sure why I get hungry as soon as I board a plane.  

I’m so thankful we had the chance to visit my sister and her family; I got to hug my nieces and nephews, including the wailing new baby one.  We saw so many friends and family in the UK too, not everybody we had hoped (due to others having COVID) but more than I’d thought we’d get to see.  Will it be another three years before I can return?