On Saturday night we took a job to Hodgson Downs in the Northern Territory. It is in the middle of nowhere
about two and a half hours flying from Darwin. This was quite a difficult job from an aviation perspective
with thunderstorms and severe showers hampering our departure and ability to get to the location. The
job was to a woman who was about to give birth only through 25 weeks of the pregnancy term.
Unfortunately the baby was born before we managed to get there and died. 25 weeks apparently is not
sufficient for survival as a general rule of thumb.

I delayed the departure due to the difficulties associated with the weather. This is not the first time I
have had to make such decisions and won't be the last time. It does dwell on my mind sometimes that "if
only" we had left earlier then maybe we could have saved a new life. We will never know.

Our aircraft had a problem upon return with one of the engines. Not an
uncommon event. The public would probably be horrified to learn that
aircraft have issues all the time just like any other piece of machinery. So as I
am writing this I am in the cockpit of our aircraft whilst our engineer
replaces the fuel filters on our engines. It is raining outside so for Ed our
engineer the conditions are not exactly pleasant.

Whilst I am seeing my own children now enter into formal relationships, time has not dulled my memory too much of the joy of bringing another soul into this world. It is one of life's greatest events and privileges as a human being to participate in the raising of children.

And so as I recognise the value in other's lives and the joy those lives bring to
me I also recognise the value in my own and the joy that I also bring to others. Something that I suspect
most of us don't think about a great deal. There is value in all of our lives to somebody. Maybe we should
value ourselves more than we do. There is another message in there somewhere!

But life can be all too brief. For some, like the baby we didn't get to on Saturday night, don't get to
breathe more than a few breaths in their lifetime. For others like my grandfather who died a few months
ago at the age of 96, life can be full of exploits and memories yet is probably still all too brief. In any
event whatever you or I get in life, we must make the most of it and commit to serving each other in this
grand game.