I Didn’t Think I’d Be Writing

I’m not sure why I’ve been inspired today, especially as its a day when I didn’t think I’d be writing at all. But I’ve had a great day and written more than I have in a long time. Over the last couple of months I’ve been very satisfied writing a thousand words in a day. The few times I’ve felt on a roll and written two thousand has been great, exhilarating for me. But today I’ve stretched to write almost five thousand and now at 10pm, I don’t want to stop. My story is bubbling out of me. However everyone must sleep and I’ve decided a way to let myself ease off is to describe my last couple of days in a blog post.

Three days have been marked off on my calendar for months. 14-16 October were days when I knew I would be writing nothing. My time would be fully involved representing the NZ Naval Women’s Assoc at a conference in Wellington.It was to be my first such conference and I was looking forward to learning heaps and spending an enjoyable three days rubbing shoulders with many ex-servicemen and women.

Monday 14th started very early. Leaving home at 4.15am to travel to Auckland airport to catch the 6am flight. I wanted to be in Wellington in time to attend a memorial service at the beginning of the conference. Little did I realise the eventful day ahead of me. Blissfully unaware of the rough weather quickly moving through the country, I sat on the plane perusing the conference programme for the day. The formal opening would be attended by the Governor General, the Prime Minister, the Chief of Defence Staff and the Wellington Mayor along with other dignitaries. I was looking forward to listening to them.

I didn’t take too much notice of the pilot’s warning that it was windy and there could be a bit of turbulence as we circled over Cook Strait and prepared to land. After all, its always windy in Wellington. His warning turned out to be right on the button as he aborted his first attempt at landing and did another circuit for a second attempt. The second attempt was even less successful than the first and was accompanied by the announcement that we would be diverting to Auckland.

But we had just come from Auckland!

There was a rush to the check-in counters to rebook. I was lucky enough to get onto a flight at 13.35. All I had to do was hang around the airport for five and a half hours. Thank heavens for a well loaded e-reader. When 13.00 arrived we were still unsure if we’d get off the ground or not. Many flights into Wellington had been cancelled but around midday there had been some landing. By this time I had meet up with others attending the same conference and there was a combined sigh of relief when we were called to board.

I should have guessed. Things just weren’t going to plan. We sat on the runway for an hour while some technical problem was diagnosed and fixed, but then we were off. We’d still be in time to get to the formal opening if we hurried from the airport to the conference venue.

As we descended toward landing, I noticed the white caps in Cook Strait looked a lot worse than they had hours earlier. I don’t think we got anywhere as near the ground this time as we had in the morning. There’s something very defeating about the sound of your plane gunning its engines and nosing toward the sky when you’re expecting it to land on terra firma. What can a body do? Me and the stranger sitting beside me burst out laughing as again we were told we were diverting to Auckland.

It was a long day. Five hours sitting in a plane but going – no I can’t say going nowhere. I went to Wellington twice. We flew over the runway twice then we flew back to Auckland twice. Not really what I had expected.

I was impressed by Jetstar – a budget priced airline. The weather was outside their control. I’m not really complaining. There must be plenty of people on those flights who had plans disrupted. A bunch of school kids from Wellington who’d been in Auckland to see One Direction were lining up for help as I left the airport to go home. At least I could just head home to discover the next available flight would not be until 17.15 today. I made my apologies to the conference organisers and spent my best writing day for probably a year.