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October
2010
Do
You Fly to Live, or Live to Fly?
Who among us has
not watched in amazement, a soaring bird
or an aircraft of some sort and not been
fascinated, wondering what it’s like
to be up there? Who has not
marveled at those, both man and beast who
have broken the bonds and taken
flight? Within all of us there lies
a dream. In many, that dream is to
fly. We believe it, we live because
of it. The thrill we come to expect
silently molds our future.
Harrison Ford
revealed in a magazine interview once,
his feelings about flying.
"Learning to fly was a work of art.
I'm passionate about flying. Flying is
like good music; it elevates the spirit
and it's an exhilarating freedom."
There are those
unfortunate souls however, who have never
had the good fortune to experience
flying. They’ve never even
wondered, never wished they could fly.
And some are determined that we
should not fly either!
This article
could be about politicians and
bureaucrats, the front-liners who are
seemingly against us. But I speak
of environmentalists. After stating
in his magazine interview that he often
flies “up the coast for a
cheeseburger”, Harrison Ford was
criticized by a group running a website
called CARBONFOOTPRINT.COM. These
people, obviously not pilots, were
outraged that he would use his airplane
to make such an unnecessary trip.
They called on Ford to set an
environmental example and cut back on his
flying.
Ford’s
response was something like
“I’ll start walking everywhere
when they start walking.”
If you consider
yourself a savior or the environment,
before you get on my case about these
statements, let me assure you I’m
not advocating pollution, in the air, the
water or anywhere else. But with
general aviation (the hamburger boys)
perhaps responsible for less than 1% of
the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere,
isn’t there someplace else you need
to be?
The thrill of
flight, the dream in a person, is the
reason to live rather than just
exist. What kind of world would it
be if everyone, every day of their lives
simply watched the clock, waiting for
quitting time? There is so much
more potential in the human soul, the
potential to soar above the mundane, the
drudgery and mind-numbing, boring
day-to-day drivel. Some choose a
form of excitement as their outlet.
They ski, climb mountains, ride
motorcycles, drive race cars, they sail,
swim, run marathons …. while some
fly airplanes. I say if that’s
your passion, then do it.
We’re held back at every turn, by
responsibility, protocol, rules, society
in general. Don’t let them
stop you with their agendas. Remind
these coalitions, societies,
bureaucracies and other ‘friends of
something-or-other’, of the
tremendous contributions to the good in
the world that aviation is responsible
for.
Aviation in
general has always been a popular
whipping post, easily singled out and
dumped on by someone with an axe to
grind. Airplanes are noisy,
annoying, they disrupt wildlife,
they’re dangerous, they’re
security risks, and of course they
pollute the air. While it would be
much easier to point the finger at the
automobile (apparently the number one
polluter in most cities) it’s those
who are pointing who are the
drivers. Unless they’re
willing to walk, I’m not willing to
give up flying.
Someday in the
future, airplanes and cars will be
burning something other than
petroleum-based fuels. Already
electricity and hydrogen are on the
proving grounds. Humans have the
ability to think, to reason, to invent
new products and procedures which
harmonize our lives and
environment. History shows how far
we’ve come, and we’ll get
through air pollution too. To some,
it can’t come fast enough. But
I want to experience “living”,
not just ‘life’. And
sometimes that means a balancing act
between what’s good for us
physically and what’s good
emotionally too. The day that a
clean-burning, lead-free fuel comes along
to power our airplanes can’t come
soon enough. But it will
come. By then, the people advocating
national security may have grounded us
all anyway.
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