ShaeLaurel: The Band Behind the Curtain/and/The Oracle's Apprentice
an excerpt

From the back of the plane one by one all the stewards and stewardesses grabbed what looked like a hefty manual from their own carry on and disappeared into the cockpit. I don’t pretend that we were nearly far enough forward in the plane to actually see them enter the cockpit but I had a feeling that’s where they were going. I could picture them all standing by the captain who was struggling with the steering and the co pilot saying calmly…”Alright now class. Please turn to page 1,758 in your manual. That’s right the chapter entitled ‘Imminent Disaster’.”
Somewhere in the plane a baby started to cry picking up on all the tense feelings sweeping through the plane as fast as the wind outside.
After what seemed like forever they returned in a straight line back to their positions and the captain came on the line. “Sorry about the wait, it appears that our landing gear is stuck down. Luckily we were able to take care of the other problems. Now this is all procedural stuff. Everything’s going to be fine. As you might have noticed we are circling the airport. The bumpiness is due to the fact that we have to drive slower because of the landing gear. We are in contact with the Air traffic control tower and we will be doing our best to make this a minor inconvenience. We will be making a landing and returning to Beijing shortly. Thank you for your patience.”
It annoyed me that he wouldn’t just say that we were going to make an emergency landing but I could see the sense of it. As a storyteller though, I wished he’d left me with a little more opportunity for drama. My brother Andy gave a disparaging look at the expression on my face and I knew it was time to pull myself together or risk looking clinically insane….which still has yet to be proven! I finished my frantic scribbling in my notebook and turned to listen to what my dad was saying. Something about having to dump our extra fuel or the plane would explode when we landed. Exactly what I needed. I immediately commenced worrying again. But of course the pilots knew better than to land with a full tank and so we zoomed out over a more rugged terrain and began dumping fuel. I had a good view from my window seat and I watched a long stream of what was probably thousands of dollars worth of fuel dissipate into the Beijing air. From behind me a steward pointed out the window showing off the jet to another stewardess who was snapping pictures. I distinctly heard them both as they talked. “I’ve never seen anything like this before.” Said the woman. “Me neither.” Said the man. “Of course I’ve heard of it before. But I’ve been working on plains for 17 years and I’ve never seen it first hand before!”
Very reassuring.