When someone wakes you up with a phone call saying British airports are closed because of the eruption of a volcano in Iceland, don’t think it is some kind of belated April-fool joke. Had I read it in a novel or seen it in a film, I would have said: “Yeah, right! Who are they trying to kid?” Not only has the Eyjafjallajökull volcano got a name no one outside Iceland can pronounce but it has caused the kind of mayhem terrorists can only dream about.

It is a sad truth that a real catastrophe interests us less than a logistical nightmare. On the same day as the volcano spectacularly erupted through the ice, China was hit by an earthquake. More than 2,000 people died and tens of thousand were made homeless. That is a real catastrophe. The cloud of ash spewed by the volcano grounded planes and stranded hundreds of thousands of people but it was not a catastrophe. It may have been an unpleasant, tiring and expensive experience but it is not life threatening by any stretch of the imagination.

Planes being grounded threw us back to another era when traveling meant making your way across a landscape. Traveling by road, rail or boat not only takes so much longer — in my case a journey that normally takes two hours took eight hours — but it is a sensually rich experience unlike being encased inside the bullet-like structure of a plane.

For not having to call phone help lines we are truly thankful. Having information updated regularly online kept passengers abreast of everything. It also kept people entertained, enabled them to contact friends and family and also to get on with work if they so wished. This did, however, require having thought to bring your laptop with you, which was not the case for me. Never again will I leave my baby at home!

Every six hours they would announce that the airports would be closed for another six hours. The key information we wanted to hear was when flights would definitely resume, and then you could at least make plans. Uncertainty is a killer. It keeps you waiting for news. It mires you in indecision. Should you start a long trek home or should you wait it out until flights resume? Hours were spent on computers trying to work out alternative means to get home. It did not help that throughout this period French railways were hit by a strike.

Most of us take risks with our lives every day. People drive too fast on motorways, cross roads without looking, smoke cigarettes and do all kinds of things which could put their lives at risk. Governments on the other hand are obliged to apply a principle of precaution. They chose not to let planes fly as a precaution and apart from one or two voices raised in protest most of us agreed. We would rather be stranded than take a flight that has even a slightly increased risk of crashing.

I have an uncle who was an airline pilot. He was once stopped by a passenger after a flight and told off for not using the word “Insha Allah” in his flight announcements. It was arrogant to assume he was the master of the flight schedule and say, “We shall be landing at 9 p.m.” What he should say, the passenger pointed out, is “we shall be landing Insha Allah at 9 p.m.” One small volcano in Iceland shut down air travel over most of Europe, no amount of scheduling, planning, technology, money or status could get a plane in the air.  The meek and the mighty were equally grounded. And what optimists we have become! How many of us had thought to even pack an extra set of clothing?

Apparently since this is a force of nature, travel insurance does not apply though some insurance companies have kindly accepted to make a payout. Don’t hold your breath though. Mine told me not only that they have yet to get approval to make a payout but that the total I would be entitled to for my six days of delay is a whopping £60.

I was traveling with four children aged seven to twelve, other people’s children. On a crowded train, other passengers reminded me by the collection of frowns aimed at our group — and by one or two disapproving noises and remarks — that children should be seen and not heard.  Does anyone know how to do that?

Looking at the hundreds of thousands of people stranded I wondered why all of them were far from home. I love travel and consider a sedentary life a form of punishment, but what does this constant need for movement say about us? Have we lost the power to put down real roots? Most travelers don’t really need to travel; we do so out of choice. Sometimes this choice is overt. For instance when we book a holiday, sometimes it is not, such as a business trip. But the lawyer who spends more time on airplanes than at home with his family has chosen this lifestyle. Perhaps the lesson from the volcano is to give us the chance to be still for once and ask ourselves why we fill our skies with tons of flying metal.

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