'Crash Landings' Can End Softly

When I was aged six, my sister five and brother four, my Mother was flying with us from England to Australia. As the plane started its descent at Bombay to refuel, the pilot announced a problem. The plane had to prepare to crash land; quiet terror gripped the cabin. My Mother asked a strange woman in the row beside us to look after me. I had to put a cushion on my lap and lean forward. I threw up. Yet, when we landed, the wheels did descend and worked as normal. It turned out all that was faulty was a light on the cockpit dashboard. Sometimes crash landings can end softly, or, what seems to be a crash landing turns out not to be... If I had to choose one experience as a metaphor that has given my life meaning, that would be it.