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Sport 21: Spring 1998
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In all the important, decisive plane trips in your life, it is impossible to think of yourself as a passenger. Rather, from your economy class seat, you are piloting the aeroplane—it is your willpower that is lifting the 747 from the tarmac and directing it towards whatever destination you have in mind. My 22nd year is bracketed by two such flights—the first to Melbourne, a few weeks before my 21st birthday, the second back to Auckland from Sydney almost a year later.
The last thing I saw of New Zealand from my aisle seat as the late-night flight departed was a spotlit, billowing windsock—a cylinder of air, a receptacle of glowing colour against the stark blackness of the night sky. Over time, I have come to think of that windsock as a flag flying over my year away—if periods of time can have flags—a three-dimensional ensign containing and representing 12 months as well as one or two Australian cities. I came to the conclusion, not long after, that the flag of the country to which I belonged (as yet unspecified) was, in fact, a windsock.