Clap for the Pilot

If you were around in the 1960’s or 70’s, you may remember when people applauded when an air flight was over and the plane hit the ground. People appreciated and understood the dangers involved in the travel and showed their gratitude for being guided through it.

 

Few people appreciate danger anymore — air travel, a bus on a city street, a 16 story ocean liner, a racing subway or a churning ferry, surgery or a visit to the doctor’s, the daring risks taken by firefighters and policemen, driving 75 miles an hour on the interstate.

 

Few appreciate also that those in whom we place our trust to help navigate the fords of human existence are also human — and can and will make mistakes.

 

As quick as we are to assign blame when things go wrong and look for money to make things right (lawyers be blessed) rarely do we show our thanks. (We are still analyzing years later why a space shuttle flight ended in such tragedy. )

 

I think our gadgets have driven us to this – fostering an expectation that others have programmed aspects of our lives that pose a danger, to make them safe. Our expectation levels have reached fantastic heights – ones that human beings should have understood were unreasonable beyond the bounds of common sense.

 

A war must end quickly, with success, and with few casualties or someone must have planned wrong or failed to execute it with precision or to dealt with every eventuality properly.

 

If my child is not “perfect” — that must be someone’s fault — the obstetrician who failed to diagnose, the child care manual which overlooked the correct dietary supplement, the environment which has changed and now poses “too many risks”, the teacher, the school system, playgroups. When we ourselves are responsible for little, the ability to intuit and apply common sense to our lives is bred from our nature, and we are belittled.

 

Step back for perspective — intuit what really is — and applaud for the pilot on your next trip to Florida.

 

Michael D’Angelo