When planes fall from the sky

We slide into a false sense of security so quickly. The smaller risks adding up to larger ones until you no longer feel fear at the things that frightened you before. This increased risk taking typically occurs at the field level. Not saying anything to the crazy driver who navigates the vehicle at an alarming speed over potholes, across the median, around the winding mountain roads. Arguing with gun slinging soldiers instead of being polite like you were at first. And then there are the plane rides. The really scary ones. Through storms and turbulence. Getting all the way to Bunia and then turning around because there is a problem with the landing gear. Pilot friends will tell you that you have nothing to worry about. Planes can handle turbulence. There is a GPS and other instruments that guide them in a storm. Pilots are cautious, they aren’t going to crash unless a series of events go wrong. Then, people you know, people you have met at parties, people you have talked to, hugged hello and goodbye, crash into a mountain on a rainy Congo day and you feel sick every time you think about it and you can’t stop thinking about it because it could have been anyone you know, it could have been any of the people that you love and care about and it could even have been you sitting on that long leg back to Goma, thinking one more stop to go and then, from out of nowhere, death in the form of a rugged mountain peak in Bukavu, slams into you.

One year and one day before this latest crash in Congo, another plane went down and those of us who knew the pilots were frantic. The sight of Alex and Tristan climbing down out of the rescue plane the next day at the airport in Goma with muddy clothes and wild hair is probably the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. After that, I realized that there are no guarantees that life will continue for any of us. In a second, you can go from talking about your plans for the evening to final silence. So the only way to live is to be completely alive in every moment that you have. Take all of the risks and challenges that come along, do the difficult things, the right things, so that you never have any regrets. Being alive in the moment was so easy in Congo. Everything about that environment was completely in your face daring you to look away. So you dive into it the same way you dive into the onyx waters of Lake Kivu at night. Head first, laughing, in awe of the space that you are allowed to inhabit, if only for a moment.

Whether I’m taking in the view from the top of the Ngong Hills or pushing through a mass of people on the streets of Kampala, or driving past an overgrown cemetary in Bujumbura, it seems that lately I’ve become more aware that life, as short as it is, is often filled with marvelous things. Wild and vivid situations, sudden moments of revelation, and opportunities to live a life of compassion in the face of adversity. On these grounds there is no room for suffocating anger. We are all just birds spreading our wings for a moment in the sun, before the final ride on that comets tail across the universe carries us away, trailing dust and cosmic embers in its wake. In the end, death always comes too soon and so we must fly as high and as far as we can go and never look down. These are some of the lessons that I am still trying to absorb as I travel down this long road through Africa.