The Boxtops

I don't mind telling you, I typically have a love/hate relationship with flying. But it was all love last weekend, when I flew with Maggie.

I was a little globetrotter when I was younger--to England a few times, and El Salvador twice--and I don't remember being scared or even nervous. Maybe it has something to do with getting older, having things to lose, or having control of some aspects of your life and then once you buckle up in a plane you have none. A former girlfriend told me turbulence was just like a bumpy road; yeah, I said, but you probably won't fall five miles off the road.

When you fly alone, there's a lot of time for reflection, and the wonder of flying never leaves me. Not so much about how this really heavy machine can get up and stay up, but all the great sights you just don't see anywhere else: breaking through rainy gray clouds to brilliant blue; the giant cauliflower caverns of storm clouds; lightning; seeing just how fast planes go when you see another one pass by 30,000 feet in the air, because you can never tell how fast your own plane is flying; the geometry of fields and towns; the clusters of lights.

Part of that reflection and beauty is tied into mortality. Whatever will happen will happen once the wheels roll, and there's nothing you can do about it. My thoughts always turn to the life I've lived, what I would leave behind, how I would call my wife and kids and mom if there was time and an inevitable conclusion.

I think about how I would respond if I survived impact--when I was single I thought I'd save a kid's life and forfeit mine (as long as burning alive wasn't an issue), but now I have kids, and the kids I don't know would have to call for some single guy if it came to them or me.

Flying was brand new though last weekend, my first time flying alone with a child of mine. Maggie had flown four times before, but was so little, she doesn't remember. It is usually very cool to be with someone when that person is doing something for the first time, and I had a blast explaining everything--moving walkways and escalators (had to pick her up, though she did try both); e-ticket machine; security process (no problems going to Denver, but she freaked on the way home); then boarding and buckling up.

We had window seats on the outbound trip, though partially obscured by an engine. Unfortunately it was rainy and overcast, and the three factors limited the fun of having a window. Maggie didn't care, and the takeoff, something I would normally be squirmy about, especially in soggy weather, was spent vicariously taking off for the first time with her.

It wasn't long before the pilot, who liked to share all he knew rather than keep us blissfully ignorant, told us that the ride would be rough for half the trip. The weather moving through, and the proximity of a 700-mph jet stream.

Great. The cow spends his dull life happily because he doesn't know he's destined for a bash on the skull and a Happy Meal box. I get to imagine just what this guy means by 'rough' while we're still climbing. Then we find out, and I believe it was the worst I've been in, as far as dipping and yawing.

My brain wrung out the memories of last year's flight from Rio to Paris that broke up in turbulence, and the flights to Hawaii that end up with holes in the roof. Sure, these planes are built for it, but that wing seems like it's going to snap! I had to be cool under pressure for Maggie, though, because right then she was.....yelling, "Whoo, whoa, whoa, uh-ohhh, whoa!" Laughing and enjoying.

I told her it was like a roller-coaster ride, and she said she liked roller-coasters (though she's never been on one). She made it better for me, and I stopped imagining myself covering her with my body as we went down, in a futile but necessary attempt to trade my life for hers.

No drinks were spilled and it finally calmed long enough for us to make beaded jewelry for her cousins Lilo and Maggie on our tray tops. I got a great shot of Maggie in the pilot's seat on the way out.

The way home was much less eventful--we flew on a new and beautiful 777; aisle seats; headphones (hers: kids' music; mine: air-traffic channel); seat-back TVs (some Disney Channel show; Tim Gunn's show), shortbread cookies, cranapple juice, and not one bump.



More on what happened between flights later. Hint--it was very cool.