Volcanic ash over Europe (2)
So many people and so many events have been impacted by the volcanic ash over Europe which has grounded flights for five days now.
On Friday, I attended a seminar on postal services at the London office of Consumer Focus and my colleagues Rick and Keillin from Northern Ireland were unable to catch their flight and had to use a video link.
On Saturday, my sister Silvia celebrated her 60th birthday with a big party in Leicester and our brother Ralph could not make it because he had flown to Belgium to attend an academic conference in Ghent and could not get back.
Today my friend Eric should have been in Brazil giving a speech at a conference in Sao Paolo, but he is still in London and will have to address his remarks over a video link in his living room.
At the 60th birthday party, I spoke to an Anglican minister who suggested that the experience of flights being grounded should in turn ground us. He saw it as a humbling experience that should teach us that we are less in control of our world that we often think we are.