Dear Drivers on the road, Pilots up in the blue skies and the Captains out there across the mighty waters...

How many times we have trusted our lives into your good compassionate hands, I've of course forgotten. Forgive me.

But I've never forgotten the sense of deep gratitude that washed over me every time the wheels of my plane safely touched the ground, or my boat safely docked at a pier, or my bus arrived unharmed in a city far away.

Every time I heard that “this is your captain speaking!” over the intercom, I felt like objecting since it always felt like “this is your Protecting Angel speaking!”

Although we've always been total strangers to you, you've still treated us like your own family each and every time, your own unnamed friends and precious others, and carried us safely to our destination where other loved ones usually waited for our arrival.

Blessed be your inner compass which regards any safe passage its ultimate honor and holly duty.

Blessed be your long years of training which you've mastered for our benefit, wrestling with equipment so complex none of your passengers can understand even after a life time of study.

Blessed be all those times when you had a cold or a headache or a heartache just like any of us would, yet you pressed on and persevered in doing a job well despite your discomfort and did to perfection and delivered us safely to distant lands.

May you be happy. May you be healthy. May the hands, brains and the noble spirit that served us so well for all these years also be the wings to transport you just as easily to a fine place without worries in this world and beyond.

Amen.