Today is the 10 Year Anniversary of a Miracle
On Jan. 15, 2009, a US Airways Airbus safely landed in the Hudson River after striking a flock of geese while taking off from New York City.
For survivor Ric Elias the experience of almost dying left a lasting impression on him as a human being, husband, and, in his eyes most importantly, as a father.
From Ric Elias’s TED talk:
Imagine a big explosion as you climb through 3,000 ft. Imagine a plane full of smoke. Imagine an engine going clack, clack, clack. It sounds scary…
Terror. Life was over.
“15, 14, 13.” You can see the water coming.
And as we’re coming down, I had a sense of, wow, dying is not scary. It’s almost like we’ve been preparing for it our whole lives. But it was very sad. I didn’t want to go; I love my life. And that sadness really framed in one thought, which is, I only wish for one thing. I only wish I could see my kids grow up.
About a month later, I was at a performance by my daughter — first-grader, not much artistic talent–Yet!
And I’m bawling, I’m crying, like a little kid. And it made all the sense in the world to me. I realized at that point, by connecting those two dots, that the only thing that matters in my life is being a great dad. Above all, above all, the only goal I have in life is to be a good dad
I was given the gift of a miracle, of not dying that day. I was given another gift, which was to be able to see into the future and come back and live differently…
Thank you.
This is beautiful. Thank you for sharing it with us.
Yup I agree. These recent articles are so inspiring for us parents who are getting overwhelmed by the daily life of a house full of monsters, I mean kids;)
wonderful to hear, I guess I’ll keep on blogging;)
Bs´d
This is beautiful and very inspiring. I´m with my kids in vacaction now and this message really strengthened me.stregthened the value of my work. of this precious work of parenting. thank you.
good to hear!