In darkness the blinking light is constant, a beacon to guide the landers, the birds of the night, the propelled, the lifted up, the crow flyers. Everyone knows of straight lines, it is practical, reasonable, possible, and preferred to float above. The ground is busy, crowded, and confining. Air is the high road, spacious, and liberating. Piloting is obsessing, an alternate lifestyle complete with siblings, secret codes, and Crown Victorias.
Commerce was a jump, Magnolia was a leap, the Arkansas morning air was fresh and cool. Full of tree farm oxygen, smelling of pine. The soggy bottoms, the muddy fairways, the weedy greens. Sloppy, sloppy golf, but glory shots by all. Wal-Mart bags of ice beer, an overpriced pool, and one working cart at Magnolia Country Club. Evidently, El Dorado Country Club, up the road, has decimated the membership, and for good reason. No one wants to be a part of an electrocution.
A spirited start with defensive intensity. Up in the space, swatting and reaching for everything, lots of obstruction, lots of pestering. Easy buckets. Then the clamp, then the streaky, then the turnovers. Blood, concussions, collisions, step backs, put backs, and kick backs. Like kicking mules, like an air guitar, like 5 cannon balls from the Texas cannon, a decoy by the end. Deception is the art of winning. Community establishments and downtown folks, lit up by the fight, neon and open, loud and excited. Playoffs secured, some madness in March assured, this ride ain't over yet.
Mental checklist of flight. Visual inspections, the rudder, the props, the seals, instruments, navigational tools, tire pressures, buckles, headphone ears. Then the engine roars, get it hot. Taxi the runway, tower permission to depart, easy lift, climbing and veering east. From Perrin Field at sunrise, my elementary education continues, learned to fly. Over Bonham, then Blue Ridge, at 3,000 feet, solo, for five solid minutes, executing slight turns and slight climbs and slight dives. Flown like a mule.