Coincidence?

I'd reached the airport one early December morning to catch a flight to New Delhi and was just congratulating myself on making it an hour before scheduled takeoff when a voice on the public announcement system informed us that the flight was delayed by 45 minutes and would now take off at 7:45 a.m. After doing some quick mental calculations, I figured that allowing for a further delay of 10 to 15 minutes, we should land in Delhi shortly before 10:00 a.m and considering the time it would take to get to the arrival gate after landing, finding the chauffeur of my hired vehicle, beating traffic and finding the location of the new office building at Gurgaon, I would just about make it in time for my meeting at 11:00 a.m.

So, the flight took off at around the (new) scheduled time of departure and at around 9:35 a.m., when we should have been getting ready to land, the captain anounced that there was heavy fog at Delhi (I had actually forgotten that I needed to schedule meetings for a bit later in the day during winter) and while we would be the first to land once the fog cleared, it was expected that we'd be circling for quite some time. But there was enough fuel left for an hour, so we might as well make ourselves comfortable.

This announcement woke me rudely from my slumber and when I looked out of the window the fog was so thick, it seemed that the plane was not moving at all. The only thing I could do under the circumstances was pray to my favourite archangel, Michael. I've got to land by 10:00 a.m., I said, and be at the office at 11:00 a.m. It was one of those moments when you want something so badly that all your attention is focused on that one thing only to the utter disregard of everything else. In just a few minutes the captain announced that we were preparing for landing and switched the 'fasten seatbelts' sign on. Most of the passengers thought it was a joke coming so close on the heels of the previous announcement and, indeed, the fellow in front of me refused to straighten his seat despite the airhostess telling him to. (If they were a little firm with such passengers, the inconvenienced ones would not have to get things done themselves.) At 2 minutes or so before 10:00 a.m., the lady next to me said, "I thought we were supposed to land. We still seem to be stuck in midair. Looks like we're in for another long wait. You just can't see anything but fog." "Yes", I agreed. And suddenly, there was a bump as the plane landed and after we'd managed to shut our drooping jaws, we looked out of the window and could discern the shape of some vehicles near the tarmac. When we got out of the plane, though, the fog had all but cleared and there were surprised but happy faces all around.

Coincidence? I prefer to think of it as a miracle because as long as I believe in miracles, I know there's always hope.

Oh, did I forget to mention I reached the office exactly at 11:00 a.m.?

Thanks, Mikey !!