Fear

I grew up flying. My dad was a pilot and had his own plane. It was hangered out of town and as I remember a 4 passenger Piper Cub. He loved to fly. He would sometimes take me flying and let me “fly the plane.” He would do big loops and dives and other things that scared the crap out of me. He would say “it will make you tough.” And maybe it did.

He belonged to a group called the “Flying Farmers” and they used to fly out every Saturday morning to a different small town and eat breakfast there and then fly home.He looked forward to Saturdays.

I remember once my grandma was at the airport one day and was asking a million questions. My dad said “Oh mom get in the plane and I will just taxi down to the end of the runway and back and you can say you were in a plane.” She got in and off they went... well there was no right back. He took her on a very short flight. It probably would have been longer but she got air sick all over his plane. It was so not funny at the time. But it sure is now. And if he were still alive I think he would agree. After his heart attack they took his pilot’s license away and that almost killed him. He did love to fly.

After his heart attack he retired on disability. (He was an electrician and worked hard all his life.) They bought a big diesel motor home. One year they spent the summer in Alaska. I remember seeing their photos of this beautiful state. Then they started going to Quartzite Arizona each winter. They would leave after they voted in November and come back in early spring. Then in the 80’s he got extremely bad sick with his heart and was flown by air ambulance from Arizona to a heart center in San Diego. The outlook was grim. So my sister and I flew out there. From Fort Wayne to South Bend where we picked up the foot ball team. Then on to Denver. I did pretty well till some where between Chicago and Denver. I am sitting there and all the sudden it pops into my head Oh Sh*t there is nothing under me. I start sweating. I can’t breathe. I thought I was having a heart attack. It was horrible. I was convinced that I was going to die of fright. Fear of flying is No joke. It took every bit of strength I had to change planes in Denver and go on to San Diego. Well San Diego was fogged in so we actually landed in LA and were bussed to San Diego airport. I was never so glad to get on the ground.

I got to see my dad the next day and he was very sick but recognized me. He had a heart valve replaced (with a pig valve) and a quadruple bypass. It was touch and go for a while but he did pull through. He lived one more year.

I considered taking a bus home. For Real I was that scared. But I sucked it up and got on the plane when we landed in Denver we were delayed due to an ice storm. After sitting on the tarmac for a couple hours we were back in the air and on home to Indiana. A couple days later a plane went down into the Potomac River due to icing on the plane. .

I was never afraid to fly with my dad.

I am tough.