Scrolling Through What Could Have Been

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There it is – that photo from a year ago. You are boarding the plane to Montreal, probably tired from packing at the last minute, maybe annoyed about the early departure time. The CASWE-ACFTS conference registration receipt is still in your bag, and the presentation slides saved on your laptop. Just another work trip. Just another flight.

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But today, seeing that memory pop up, your finger hesitates on the screen. Because now you know what you didn’t know then – that the same type of plane, that familiar Boeing 787 you’ve trusted so many times, can feel “stuck in the air” five seconds after takeoff. That green and white lights can flicker like a warning you’ll never get to heed.

Pause.

You remember settling into your seat that day – was it 11A like Vishwash Kumar Ramesh? Did you buckle your seatbelt the same way he did? Did you feel that same gentle acceleration, that moment when wheels leave tarmac and you’re suddenly, impossibly, flying?

The Montreal trip feels different now. Not just a memory of academic sessions and networking dinners, but evidence of a thousand small miracles you never thought to count. The successful takeoff. The smooth flight. The descent into Montreal’s skyline. The unremarkable beauty of stepping off the plane and immediately worrying about baggage claim and ground transportation – alive, unaware, ungrateful for the simple fact of arrival.

Another pause.

You think about posting something, maybe sharing the memory with some reflection about safety or gratitude. But what words fit this feeling? How do you capture the weight of understanding that your routine flight was actually a gift you didn’t know you were receiving?

Vishwash said he has “no idea” how he escaped. But maybe the real mystery is how any of us do – how we climb into metal tubes and hurtle through the sky and arrive where we intended, how we take for granted what should feel miraculous every single time.

Keep scrolling?

No. You set the phone down. Because sometimes Facebook memories aren’t just about remembering where you’ve been. Sometimes they’re about recognizing how lucky you were to make it back to remember at all.

That conference receipt is probably still in some drawer somewhere – a small, forgotten artifact of the day you flew and lived and never knew how precious both were.

My deepest condolences to everyone who lost someone on that Air India flight. To the families of little Sara, Akeel, Hannaa, the Greenlaw-Meeks, the medical students, and all 241 people who were simply trying to reach their destinations that Thursday morning. Each journey mattered. Each life was precious. They are not forgotten.