Flying in a Large Aircraft For the First Time

Before we even leave the runway, I like feeling the engines come to life. Whhhirrrrr.

Looking down at cities, towns, and farmlands, they’re fragmented like glass shards by roads, railways, and edges of fields.

I think about my grandfather, the hobby pilot, who took me on my first ever visit to the sky. How much does his diseased mind remember of this sensation now — traversing a domain once reserved for only birds, clouds, wind, and brief shooting stars before mankind crafted our first wings?

I’m trying not to giggle when my ears pop. I want to.

The take-off phase sure takes a while.

The clouds look so uncommitted to being clouds, when we’re so close. I understand this, and it’s not a new observation, but I notice and think about this again anyway.

I have no fear of the flying. Maybe because Grandpa introduced me to this when I was young. But the airports? The crowds, the noise, the hundreds of conversations at once; they get under my skin.  

I hate the sensory onslaught of the airports, but I actually enjoy some of the sounds and the vibrations of the airplanes. The engines, the taxiing on the runway, the ascents and descents, the banking…

Being in the sky feels good. It reminds me that there’s more to everything than my tiny worldview.

The landing is pretty neat too. Rumble rumble rumble.