Wheels Up

My desktop widget has been counting down the days and minutes and seconds until 7:15am, Monday December 4. In my correspondence with Timmy over the past several months I have concluded the emails with “[so many] days to wheels up.”
Well, that was 19 hours ago. Now our wheels are tucked under this 747 Longreach as we span the Pacific en route to the place that has occupied at least a part of so many conversations in the past months.
Those conversations have long passed and so has the ability to turn back. On the seat screen in front of me, I’ve got the channel tuned to the flight details and progress screens. We’re getting farther and farther out into the area without green or brown on the east—into no man’s land (or no man’s water).
And, so, the journey begins . . . no longer in hope, no longer in conjecture. It’s here. It’s now. It’s ours to finish.
It came so fast, despite the 10-month wait and 12-month planning. It almost surprised me and would have, had I not had to work so hard to finish my design work in order to leave my office. In rapid succession now, we will cross promised thrills off our list. Bang, bang bang. It will probably go that fast.
So, as I savored the expectancy, I now begin to savor the reality. It’s absorption time, watching Timmy sleep against the window, sampling all the courses the Quantas folks serve us, and listening to the accents of fellow passengers.
Hopefully, writing them here will help me keep them for always.