I slept last night with plans of writing about being giddy on my London book finds today. It was all planned out, use my Oyster to Windsor, look for a place to sit within castle grounds, write, then spend the entire day wandering around and getting lost at the Queen's weekend home. Found myself sitting in church this afternoon instead, literally just hearing mass, since I could not remember a single thing about the sermon.
Woke up to this today. It wasn't even on Facebook yet, just saw the link on Twitter. I found myself thinking "Oh nooo," thinking that the crew made it out safe with only minor injuries, or that the worst case scenario was the crew having injuries that were not life-threatening. Was absent mindedly reading (skimming, actually) through it, until I saw the FI's name. I froze when I saw that it was my colleague's.
Was in disbelief, but still messaged his wife, m'Laurice, (also a colleague) somehow praying that it was just kapangalan, although I knew that this colleague was taking up flying too. She replied that indeed, it was him, and she was on her way to the Malolos hospital where he was brought, but had no details yet. I sent him one too, asking if he was alright. After sending, I posted the same link to our Facebook group.
In less than 5 minutes, the headline was changed to this.
As bad as it may sound, I had hoped it wasn't him. Though alarm bells have been going off in my head (plus the fact that we all knew he wasn't a student anymore), I still hoped that he was the one who was still alive and fighting, albeit being critical.
"P******."
Forgive my truck driver mouth (rather, fingers), I was floored. Think I had repeated that expletive in five-minute intervals, verbally and in text messages; every sentence had it.
Just like that, s'Archie was gone.
It was really crushing; one of the best souls in the industry was no longer with us.
 |
| Photo from m'Laurice's account |
He and m'Laurice are two of the nicest people you would ever meet. One would be looking forward to fly, even the flights tagged as "basura", if one of them was in the lineup. You'd know how proud they are of their son Pio, by the way they talk about him on lull periods. "Ang sarap magka anak," he'd always say. "It's the best feeling in the whole world."
It's one of the million reasons why his abrupt departure was so heartbreaking. And perhaps another one was how he was called home.
"It doesn't always mean that if we leave [for a flight], we are bound to return."
I remember reading this after MH17 was shot down last year. It was from the spouse of one of the flight's stewards, who also worked as a flight attendant for MAS. I realized then how much I take for granted, how short life is. Thought about it for quite a while and acted on it.
The aviation industry is very unforgiving. As cruel as it may sound, behind the #crewlife, #blessed, #workation hashtags on pictures and statuses on every social media platform; behind the glamour and grandeur that seems to be attached to the labels "pilot" and "flight attendant" lies the ugly truth that each flight may be a last. That truth has never been entertained though; all our training gave us confidence that somehow, we are invincible.
Maybe that's why it always feels like a suckerpunch when something like this happens. All the emergency situations in training which you supposedly prepared for suddenly feels real; so real that it somehow "paints" a vivid picture of what the pilots (or crew) went through minutes and seconds before crashing, giving you "flashbacks" to what never happened [to you], and what you will never know.
And it feels worse when it happens to a friend.
As soon as I heard, I couldn't organize my thoughts to be able to pray. I couldn't go past "Lord..." I was so confused if I wanted to ask why, ask for something, say something, rant, or rave; I was being mobbed by my very own thoughts, and I had desperately wanted to pray. I decided to go to church.
Once I was inside St Paul's Cathedral, I was staring into space, whilst the mass was ongoing. I was still stuck at "Lord..." However, when I knelt in an attempt to pray during the Eucharist, I was able to get something out.
"Lord, I pray that s'Archie asked you this morning to have safe flights today..."
Everything just flowed after. Even ending it by begging Him to keep the aviator I love most safe from harm's way always, especially since dad was flying out.
"...I pray that s'Archie asked you this morning to have safe flights today..."
I thought about this a lot on the way back to Feltham. When was the last time I had asked for a safe flight?
Before each flight, I had always left the house with a prayer to keep every member of the house safe and out of harm's way whilst I was away for work; to keep dad's flights the safest if he was on duty. That was my routine. When I was stuck in traffic, I prayed to make it on time for reporting, and upon reaching the office, say thank you to Him, and went about my business. At night, I would sometimes forget to pray, or if I did, it was to thank Him for the day, and to pray for something else.
I couldn't remember the last time I had asked Him to keep my flight safe. Or to keep me safe. But I do remember being in tears, begging Him in prayer to keep my family safe, to keep an extra eye on them, to watch over them instead of me for the day.
I forgot the reason I prayed for that, but it was before a flight. "Watch over them today, miske wag na ako so it's just focused on them; kaya ko Po today, Lord, just please don't make them pabayaan..."
I remember repeating that prayer when my brother got into an accident in Boracay. I somehow believed that if I became extra cautious nalang, I'd be fine.
We would never know what happened at that fateful moment, but I'm sure that at those last moments, s'Archie thought about his family. Probably even prayed about them more than for himself, being the good man that he is.
"C., relax lang, wag mo na painitin ulo mo dahil sa banyo," I remember him telling me this on one of our flights when I had stepped in for my flymate Ravenna. I was really pissed off then. Won't bore you with the details, but I remember feeling kalmado almost immediately after him saying that.
After that, he'd tease me "baka mainit nanaman ulo mo ha," whenever I'd bump into him in the office. I guess it'll take quite a long time before I'd hear that again.
I guess God needed him home. Heaven had needed two more pilots.
"Nobody who has not been up in the sky on a glorious morning can possibly imagine the way a pilot feels in free heaven."
Ma'am Laurice, I will always be praying for you and Pio...
Crew rest ka na, sir. Kami na bahala dito...
Thank you so much, Captain. Have a nice flight home.
No comments:
Post a Comment