Hey everyone,
As I'm sitting here thirty-seven thousand feet above the Earth's surface looking over the white ocean of clouds below me, my breath has been taken away by the view and the simple fact that we can do this.
Perhaps I should give some context. For the next two weeks, I will be travelling with my family around France and England. My plan is to take many pictures and post said pictures and interesting stories here after each day. I'm expecting around a thousand pictures each day, so I've definitely got my work cut out for me. As always, I'll cut that down significantly in editing and I'll post only the top ten or so. Don't worry, I won't post a thousand pictures each day.
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I lifted off to the theme of Jurassic Park through my headphones, which I thought to be incredibly fitting. As the music reached its crescendo, the wheels lifted off and we were airborne. As many times as I may fly in my life, that feeling of exhilaration will never change or disappear. I love this feeling and I love watching the world pass by below the plane.
What impresses me most, however, is that airports can execute the elaborate dance that is air travel so flawlessly. For a plane to take off, likely thousands of people must do their jobs perfectly; not including the construction of the plane itself, there are still ground crew members, Air Traffic Control, airport maintenance and security, TSA…the list goes on. It's incredible that this can be done.
All of this was inspired by a conversation with a TSA worker in the shuttle from the parking garage to the terminal. He told us a lot about what it's like doing the job he has to do, and he told us about the surprising (or maybe not surprising) turnover rate the TSA has for potential employees who don't realize how much goes into the job. I would bet it's the same way for every single person who is involved in every step of the dance. Day after day, passenger after passenger, they face the pressure getting people where they need to go, keeping them safe in the air, and staying in the background of the entire process.
In everything, the hardest jobs are those that must go unnoticed, and they only get noticed when something goes horribly wrong. Before I end this post, I want to take a moment to appreciate all of the people who must do their jobs flawlessly to make air travel a possibility.
As we slowly get closer and closer to France, I say farewell O'Hare and farewell America. I shall see you again in two weeks.
That's all for now,
Alec