
                "A Swift Kick in the Pants"

               by David "Pablo" Cohn, 1/29/95
                   cohn@psyche.mit.edu
               (copyright 1995, David Cohn)
                    approx. 1500 words

        "Oh I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
         and danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings..."

Sometimes it just takes a swift kick in the seat of our pants to make
us really understand something. I had memorized John Gillespie Magee's
words because they began a poem about flight. I fancied myself a poet,
and fancied myself a pilot. I thought it was my duty to know this poem
that Magee, an RAF volunteer, had written home just two weeks before
his death. So I had memorized it. I knew the words by heart; I could,
and did, recite them to any other pilot who was sympathetic enough to
remain within earshot.  Yes, I knew these words by heart.  But it took
a kick in the seat of my pants before I understood them.

That kick came two years ago, while I was practicing for my glider
rating. I already had a single-engine license, and figured that the
glider "add-on" would be a pleasant way to pass the summer weekends.
After a dozen lazy flights in the two-place Blanik, my instructor had
turned me loose in the club's Schweizer 1-26. For those who do not
know the 1-26, it is a small single seat glider. One does not so much
climb into it as simply strap it on. It was smaller than any airplane
I had ever been in; I felt as though I could almost reach my arms out
and touch both tips of this, this toy glider.

Sitting on the runway that first time -- yes, I felt like I was
sitting *on* the runway, surrounded by this close-fitting uniform of
plexiglass and aluminum -- sitting there, I recalled my instructor's
warning: "She'll be a bit lighter on the controls than you expect --
if you're not gentle, you'll be all over the sky." 

He was right, of course. After three flights, I still didn't have the
knack of takeoffs in the 1-26. Trying to hold level at the end of the
towrope, I would overcontrol and swoop from 5 feet to 15, then down to
brusquely kiss the pavement and back up again. Each takeoff would
begin with a couple of such swoops before I could regain my timing and
composure, and fall in line behind the tug for my slow ride upstairs.

Once aloft though, the 1-26 was a joy to fly. I had been accustomed
ox-like to airplanes that must be coerced by sheer strength of arm to
alter their pitch and heading; in contrast, the 1-26 was a playful
puppy, turning and rolling at the slightest touch. I soon learned not
to consciously move the controls -- that would lead to a rough,
brutish flight.  Rather, I would *think* where I wanted to go; the
1-26 would understand, and if she were capable, would come along
happily.

We had only been together for a few flights, the 1-26 and I, but I was
beginning to think that there might be more to silent flight than just
an add-on rating. I had, for example, read about thermals.  Those
mythical, invisible columns of air which the hawks and gulls can ride
effortlessly all afternoon. I'd read about them, searched for them,
and had, from time to time, been rewarded with a trickle of lift that
had reached from below to hold me tenuously aloft. My altitude crept
imperceptibly upwards, and it was a glorious feeling: I was soaring!
Then, like a breath held too long, it was suddenly gone and I sank
heavily to earth.  Always, the hawks would look down from their lazy
circles and nod in disapproval.


It was now late afternoon, and this flight was going to be like all
the others this summer. Up to 3500 feet, a few turns here and there
like an errant child on a snark hunt. Sniffing for that elusive
thermal that might stretch my precious time in the air. Down to 1500,
then set up the pattern, airspeed, trim, airbrakes, look around, and
land.

A flight like any other. I was already descending through 2000 feet,
creeping back to the field on the scant lift from the asphalt highway
below. I had been up for 20 minutes. Not bad, I was told, for a
student at my level. A turn west over the sand pit to get me in
position, and

*WHUMP*!

I felt the sound before I heard it. The 1-26 jolted as if we'd been
smacked from below by some divine flyswatter.  A swift kick in the
seat of my pants. My first reaction, like that of all good students,
was panic -- a midair? What had I hit?  The sputter of the audio
variometer rose to a shrill whine and the turbulent air rattled us
like a dustpan. What had happened? I had control, my airspeed was in
the green, altitude was fine, and my vertical speed was... topped out
on the "up" peg. It was then that I finally realized: I had roped a
thermal. I had blundered into a rising column of air that was dragging
me skyward, whether I wanted to go or not.

Now, "wanted" might have been to mild a word for the situation. I had
begun to dream of lift, my nights filled with visions of floating
effortlessly, silently among the hawks and gulls. Yes, I wanted this
thermal, and I was not going to let it get away.

The 1-26 responded even as I thought it, and cut hard left into a
steep bank. (Look first! Whew, we're clear) Nose on the horizon, bring
it back to minimum sink speed, start feeling for the core....  The
sequence came to me like a checklist. I had read this, and had read it
well. More bank when the vario tone drops, less as it rises.  The
vario howled.  My altimeter wound up at a dizzying rate --- 3000 feet,
4000 feet, now 5000. The VSI remained stuck on its peg; I was climbing
at least 1500 feet per minute and the ground pulled away like I was
riding a glass elevator. Where would it stop?

It stopped just above 8500 feet. Spit me out the top into the smooth
air above and there I was. I discovered, to my amazement, that the
thermal was still down there below me.  I could circle, lose a few
hundred feet, and regain the bubbling turmoil that would carry me up
again.

Eight thousand five hundred feet. Not high by any standards, but it
had taken me less than five minutes to get there. It had been
effortless, and now here, silent and all alone in the late afternoon,
I could stay. 

But I was not alone. As the green earth turned a slow pinwheel below
me, I saw for the first time that I had company. Sixty feet ahead and
away, casting a wary eye back at this sheet metal pretender from
below, a lone gull circled with me.

Our eyes met, and it was clear that this was *his* thermal, into which
I had stumbled uninvited. Of course I was uninvited -- what bird would
welcome the company of so ungainly a contraption?  But the gull chose
to tolerate my company. I was not nearly so bad as the shrieking metal
machines which came and left the airport all day; I was small and
quiet.  For an intruder, I was fairly innocuous. I would be allowed to
stay.

It might have been pathos, too. Anthropologists tell of primitive
island cultures that, seeing airplanes fly overhead, built facsimilies
out rock and wood. Were they built out of worship? Imitation? As a
lure to bring these steel-winged gods to earth? I don't know. But
hearing these stories evoked a feeling for those people. Those who, in
awe, imitated flight they could never really know. I now wonder if the
gull had those same thoughts.  "These featherless bipeds have created
a white metal bird in my image, which awkwardly rides the same
currents of air I do.... is forbearance too much to ask?"

And so we circled that afternoon. The gull, a consummate pilot,
watching me, and keeping a safe distance. Me, no... us, the 1-26 and
I, following around in that silent windswept world.

I said earlier that I had memorized Magee's poem, and that I would
recite it to any pilot who would listen. I thought it was unlikely
that the gull had heard it before. I don't imagine he heard it that
afternoon either, separated by sixty feet and a sheet of plexiglass.
But I know he understood it, just as I understood it for the first
time when the words came to me then, under my breath:

        "Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth,
         And danced the skies on laughter silvered wings;
         Sunward I've climbed and joined the tumbling mirth
         Of sun-split clouds and done a hundred things
         You have not dreamed of --
         Wheeled and soared and swung
         High in the sunlit silence.
         Hovering there
         I've chased the shouting wind along and flung
         My eager craft through footless halls of air.
         Up, up along delirious, burning blue
         I've topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace,
         Where never lark, or even eagle flew;
         And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
         The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
         
         Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
                     -- John Gillespie Magee Jr., "High Flight"
