Kites and Clouds and Days of Distant Dreams
By
Michael Wetzel
© 1990, 2006
The glider slipped silently across the fresh-plowed field, as a wave of wind sent the small balsa plane sailing from my childhood hand into the warm summer breezes crossing my Aunt Mignon's farm. When I was a child my balsa planes and paper kites lifted my imagination from the grassy playgrounds to the silhouettes of billowing clouds. There were hours when I would recline on my back keeping vigil over the clouds and the jet trails which connected cloud to cloud. But it wasn't until I was an adult that I was finally able to board my first jet and drift above some unknown schoolyard.
On the fourth of July I normally indulged in the local fireworks, but in 1982, I viewed them from a different perspective. My wife, Shirley, and I were flying into Marquette, Michigan, my job interview as a pastor of a new church. We had driven across the Mackinac Bridge numerous times before. We had traversed the three hours of wooded scenery, endured the monotony of the Seney stretch, and broken out of the forest along the Munising harbor on the south shore of Lake Superior. But this time we were flying from Lansing to Marquette.
It was a hot and humid night with thunderstorms moving in overhead. We had farmed our children out to friends who stood waving from the security of the air terminal. Shirley and I walked from the terminal, through the umbilical type hallway, toward the protective enclosure of the plane which would usher us across the line into a new life experience. A crisp young stewardess welcomed us through the small opening into the muffled air and cushioned seats. I felt a sense of security by the closed quarters, like a child cuddling under his blanket. But I also began sensing a feeling of impending something or other.
My childhood fantasies of flight were suddenly a reality. Yet, there was a sense of fear about this reality, about moving into the unknown, about giving up the security of the ground and putting my trust in free flight. I had flown on a small plane as a child and experienced a mix of fear and exhilaration. And then, when I was a senior in high school, a childhood friend compelled his parents to pay for his flying lessons. He was killed in a flying mishap. He would buzz the shores of a local lake, waving his wings at another of our friends. He banked his wings several hundred yards from shore at an altitude of about fifteen feet. The last bank was too close. A wingtip caught the water, slamming the small Cessna into the lake. Anxiety clouded my childhood desire to fly. There was a longing to wave my wings above my earth below. Yet there was a lingering fear.
Now as I stood looking down the aisle crowded with passengers, I wondered if I had made a mistake, and should have stuck to my familiar mode of travel. The closeness of these quarters was broken only by conditioned air and the bright lighting of the seating area. I was slightly chilled by the contrast from the heavy humidity outside and the coolness inside.
We had been given assigned seats like in fifth grade when I first attended Miss Moyer's class. It was after one of her recesses that I carried in my wounded kite, with a handful of tangled string. "Bring it to my desk," she commanded. I was certain I would forfeit it since it was the cause of my lateness. I had heard the school bell clanging its signal to return to our seats. But my kite was too high. I frantically grabbed handfuls of string trying to protect myself from penalty. Then, as I handed her the mass, Miss Moyer smiled, sent me back to my seat, and spent the remainder of her class time teaching and gently undoing my mess. I observed her placidly from my seat, knowing all was well.
Now, a lifetime later, I sat in my window seat, wondering if all was well. A voice smoothly instructed us in the ways of emergency procedure. Should this flight be unavoidably aborted, we were assured precautions had been taken. My seat would become a flotation device if we plunged into the deep coldness of Lake Michigan. I was afforded a plastic face mask for emergency breathing. We were told it would drop from somewhere on the ceiling and hang limply in front of us, expecting us to exercise the brief training we had received in anxious moments before our ascent. I was mildly comforted by printed instructions in a magazine pouch at my knees. I only hoped that if we dropped from the sky, I would retain my reading abilities.
I pulled one of the in-flight magazines from the pouch in front of me and began to elude my apprehensions in an article about some tropical place. I began to feel warm and secure as I imagined myself drifting lazily among the pulsing ocean waves, sipping some exotic mixture from a coconut shell.
"Will all passengers please fasten their seat belts?" The announcement jolted me back to reality. After I buckled up, I began exploring the knobs and levers around me. My high-backed cushioned seat could recline or sit stiffly in an upright position. Above my head I discovered adjustable hissing nozzles. By rotating a small ring around its perimeter I could regulate the flow of cool fresh air it exhaled. I was able to direct it toward my face with a gentle breezy effect, not unlike those breezes of my childhood fields. By leaning downward I could see through the porthole window next to me. Through thick glass I could view the white riveted wing in the darkness of the night. Drops of ran began pelting the window, blurring my view of the light-speckled runway.
A scene from an old television program, The Twilight Zone, invaded my memory. One episode portrayed a terrifying creature, which resembled bigfoot, skulking around on the wing of an airplane during the flight. As a businessman watched in horror through his wingside window, the creature scurried about on the wing and proceeded to rip apart the sheet metal, popping rivets with ease. A giant, powered by fears, worked within my mind to deter me from the beauty of the wisping clouds above. Like the children of Israel, I was fearful that some looming giant would shred my security as I lofted into an unknown world.
As I gazed out my window, I observed no creature. But I wondered. How could they compel this chunk of metal, this corpulent composition packed with people, machinery, cold drinks, and quantities of dry-roasted peanuts, into the air? How did the whole thing hold together? Wouldn't the sheet metal catch in the wind, pop its rivets, hurtling us all into Lake Michigan, scrambling for our floatation devices?
Suddenly jet engines began a slow whine, sending a slight shudder of anticipation throughout the plane. I took a cleansing breath, slow and deep. I had mastered this in Lamaze childbirth classes with my wife. It had an amazing ability to release tension from deep within the soul. Shirley took my hand and smiled. I inhaled deeply, exhaling slowly, as I caught the cool conditioned air from the nozzle. I directed it toward my nose and released a more intensive flow. Picking up the magazine, I endeavored once again to escape to Fiji, or Hawaii, or wherever the words would take me. But the words blurred on the page, and I resorted to perusing the pictures.
The plane shuddered gently. We were moving. My grip eased from the seat handle as moments passed. Gee, I thought, this isn't so bad. I assumed we were moving down the runway, beginning our ascent. It's not so bad. Just like before, I thought.
I was nine years-old again, standing in my blue Cub Scout uniform, with a freckled-faced fascination. With three other cubs, I boarded the single engine, propeller driven plane. The taxi down the runway was smooth, with a slight jarring as we lifted into the sky. My eyes remained closed for the first half of that brief tour. After I assured myself that we were not going to plummet from the sky, I searched the countryside for my house, for my school, for any affinity to my earth below. From somewhere deep in my pocket came a small lone marble. I smiled -- and slipped it out the window, wondering where it would come to rest. Suddenly, the serenity of that scene dissolved as I was jolted back to the present. The jet engines had slowed to a muffled lull. Is something wrong? I wanted to ask. I thought we were leaving. I thought we were on our way. What's wrong? Squinting through the rain-splattered window, I could discern that we were still squatting on the runway. Before I could summon a stewardess, a deafening roar surged through the plane. A turbulent quaking rattled my thoughts as the engines prepared for departure. A nauseating awareness informed me: Now...you're taking off. And I knew it. I felt it. And I wanted no part of it.
All of my religious beliefs stepped to attention. The plane vaulted forward, and as I was crushed back into my seat, my thoughts screamed, Oh Lord -- get me out of here! I want to go back. I want to go back. I don't want to take this trip." Like a fearful Israel crying, "Take us back to Egypt," I pleaded for God to let me off. But it didn't work. It was too late for pious pleas. I was constrained to continue. I had been assigned a seat and I feared I was about to encounter some unknown terror in the outer darkness.
I probed for the paper bag -- just in case. I could sense beads of sweat on my forehead. My judgment frantically attempted to make sense of the frenzied thoughts. With a roaring score we orchestrated the runway, bouncing from high note to low.
Abruptly, the jostling wheels of our jetliner quieted as I felt myself boosted as in an express elevator. I observed the earth plummet away from me. The familiar security of solid earth was ripped from my grasp. There were trees, and then treetops, and then a detachment of highways and the warm lights of homes fading into the distancing horizon. I took a cleansing breath. Smoothness set in. I began to relax and retrieved my fortitude enough to examine the picture beneath our wing.
Just as I was becoming curious with the panorama below patches of black clouds, high lightened by lightning, wisped over our wing. The plane began a series of deep lurches and subtle poundings. Our pilot notified us that we were encountering "some slight turbulence." I had heard rumors of lightning striking airliners and thrusting them to fiery deaths. I didn't know if these were true. I didn't really care. There was always a first time.
A surprising lift followed by a fragment of a free-fall startled my senses. I sat obediently trusting my mortality to two human beings bolted behind the cockpit door. Like Moses and Aaron, they led us into a darkened horizon. Were they afraid? Were their senses swirling in this swiftly tilting jetliner? Could they remember their training or did they resort to some manual, searching for directions? What was the look on their faces? Were they calm and nonchalant, chatting about a recent fishing weekend? Or was a tinge of terror escalating from their inner beings? Were they in control of this burly chunk of metal? Would these professionals I could not observe be able to deliver us out of these turbulent waters of the storm?
A muffled voice from that inner asylum announced over the intercom, "Ladies and Gentlemen, thank you for your patience. We are now clearing the storm and will level off at..." I took one more deep, long breath...held it...and exhaled slowly. Outside I could distinguish a swirling sea of black boiling clouds dropping further away as each moment expired. Here I was thousands of feet above my home, above my ground, questioning why I had embraced such a deranged mode of transportation. I craved the wood-lined drive along the Upper Peninsula's roadways. I coveted the quiet drone of tires on pavement. I longed for that connection and wondered if I would survive to see another Upper Peninsula visit.
After a few moments the plane entered into a smooth flight trajectory directed for the south shore of Lake Superior. There was a sensation of stillness. Time slowed as I lost the perception of our velocity. Like a ship sailing silently across the night the plane began to glide atop an ocean of clouds.
"Would you like some peanuts, or a drink?" asked the stewardess.
"How much?" I asked.
"No charge," she smiled.
"Sure. Oh, do you have any decks of cards?" I asked.
I had promised a friend I would get him a deck with the airline logo on the box, since he collected them. Later I decided I would keep them for my own collection, as a badge of my bravery in flight.
I was beginning to enjoy the flight and was amazed at how we could still see the lights from the runway in Lansing, or so I thought. I pointed this out to Shirley, who was also amazed. There was unquestionably a short band of lights in the distance. It wasn't until we saw a break in the clouds and lights below that we comprehended that the band of lights was on the outer tip of our wing. Since we were novices, we weren't too hard on ourselves.
They sky was dark except for these random breaks in the clouds. They were unnerving at first. One moment I was watching a sea of clouds and unexpectedly the surface broke as my focus plunged to some Atlantis far below. Bits of brilliance, street lamps, parking lots, and moving vehicles lay below me. Over Traverse City, Michigan, I could distinguish what appeared to be small specks of light flaring briefly in the sky. It was the Fourth of July and the city beneath us was in the midst of their fireworks celebration. For the first time I watched from a fresh perspective. From the drifting of our ship I looked down upon the tops of blazing brilliance spraying their colors over the heads of dreamers below. From grassy fields I had observed my own fireworks. I had watched the kites, the clouds, and the jet streams arc the sky. I was only a dreamer. But now my dream was mystically real. There was a sense of wonder about the lights below.
Slowly, they diminished in the distance as the dark expanse of Lake Michigan's waters filled my small window. We were beginning to cross over. I checked again to make sure the emergency instructions were in the pouch near my knees. They were; yet I still felt hesitancy, wondering if some tragic turn of circumstance would plunge us into the depths, wondering if we would be swallowed up in a torrent of liquid blackness. There was nothing to do but trust the pilots and hope this newfound journey would turn out as promised. We crossed slowly from wave to wave, never feeling the moist wetness of the flood below. As unexpectedly as the Lake appeared it disappeared. We had crossed over and were now advancing to our journey's end. The lights of Green Bay lay below through the clear night air. The clouds had faded. The storm was over.
After a short stop, we began our ascent. I settled back into my seat as we pressed upward, anticipating more peanuts, more fireworks, and gentler cruising in the night skies. I was actually beginning to enjoy the journey. Just as we leveled off, the muffled voice announced, "Ladies and Gentlemen, we are now beginning our descent into the Marquette area. Please fasten your..."
It's over, I thought. It's over...already? I clicked my safety belt into place, returned the travel magazine to its pouch and then withdrew it again. As I leafed one more time through its pages I heard the distant call of palm shaded beaches. Then I shifted back in my seat and applied my attention to the window.
As the wing flaps lowered, our plane shifted into low gear and began crawling down from the altitudes. We entered a spotty thicket of clouds as the engines slowly whined their descent. We broke through the clouds, into the lights of Marquette below, shooting over the city, across the dark surface of Lake Superior and back into the blackened night. Slowly we banked in a wide arc forcing me to view the depths below. For a moment I remembered the giant on the wing. But, in an instant, I could again see the lights of the city. As we bolted smoothly across the parks and playgrounds I could detect the runway lights ahead. We slipped silently above and beyond tree lined streets as the ground rose quickly to our wheels. The dream of drifting above a sea of clouds was broken by the violent vibration of rubber on runway.
We slowed. The voice spoke once more; "Thank you, Ladies and Gentlemen for flying Republic Airlines. We hope your trip was pleasurable and look forward to serving you in the future."
There was no protective umbilical canal when we stepped from the plane. As we walked down the stairs onto the runway, we were met by the cool northern air. Hundreds of miles from my childhood playground I stood on new land. I took a long full breath of pine-scented air, as we walked briskly toward the modest terminal, my thoughts gliding back to kites and clouds and days of distant dreams. The fears of flight, the longing to explore distant horizons, the crossing of lines, were now all part of those distant dreams.
Kiev Time
