more on the last theme

i should offer up at least an attempt of an explanation. over the past few weeks i have been inundated with plans for adventure, stories of legend, and dreams of grandeur. i picked up a copy of Lindbergh, by A. Scott Berg. I finally got around to jumping into it and already careened through his New York to Paris flight in 1927.

im 25. ive been to college. traveled, dreamt, loved, succeeded, and am pursuing the same dream i had when i was 10 years old which i do think is somewhat remarkable. but...

lindbergh crossed the atlantic when he was 25. he hadnt really loved, had certainly traveled, but at 25 he was already thrown into history books alongside names like columbus and magellan. the thing that strikes me as remarkable is not that he was so young, or that he stayed awake and lucid for 33 hours straight (some 63 hours total actually, hey could you sleep the night before something like that? no, you couldnt) that thing that really sets lindbergh (as well as any person that has done something truly groundbreaking and amazing) is that there does not seem to be any hesitation on their part. not only is there a lack of hesitation, but a complete inability to see anything as an obstacle, rather just one more thing to work past. there is not a hint of a day wasted due to laziness or some "well deserved rest and relaxation"

if i could put myself into a vaccuum i would. if i could escape every distraction in the world, both internal and external i would. that means not only escaping the lure of day to day black holes like a relaxing movie, or strumming away on a guitar, but putting aside other dream and other avenues. i spoke about the same thing when i was with the band and i lacked the conviction and discipline to attack that adventure with enough clarity.

things are different this time around. but i still need them to focus in a bit more. the light coming through the magnifying glass is concentrated on the leaves, but they arent smoking just yet.

i want to go further than i think i can. i dont know what that means yet, but i do know that i havent set myself to a challenge that ive questioned. first things first though...

PVD

it rained all day today. at 5pm, just when i want to go home, the main road that gets me back home was backed up for miles. i decided to just wait it out a bit and let the traffic die down. luckily for me, the rain stopped and the sky started poking its head in on the day. i managed to grab a few photos while the light was good and the rain wasnt hanging out. this is essentially where i spend all my days....
down on the up side
the lake amphig
pano-ramp-a
the old tower
the small hangar

15 minutes

i am going to record every thought i have for the next fifteen minutes, or at least attempt to. the trick is going to be not setting my mind on overdrive for the sake of this. i simply have nothing else to do at 6:46pm on a saturday.

and go

this is a little loud, i should turn it down for emma. i wonder if me having to correct typos should be included in this. it just was. i wish i could sing like that. he must have his chorus or reverb or something set way up to get that type of sustain. looooooooooove (singing along). what should i type next. what do i want to do tonight? mark wanted to hang out but i really dont feel like going to a bar, at least not one of those bars that we usually hit up. hit up is such a stupid term. i need to flight plan for tomorrow. sitting at starbucks at barnes and nobles and putting together my flight plan for manana with a godiva hot chocolate sounds like a way more enjoyable thing. manana. if you say it without the tilda on the n its almost like banana. let me turn you all over (singing along) easy e....yeah he died. okay change the channel..46 is not what i wanted...41...who the hell is Mollis for secretary of state. engineering is a cool word. ally sheedy is awesome in breakfast club. now you better tell people why youjust said that, i watched it earlier. with my thumb on your tongue (singing along). wow a marching band from 1902 it looks like. i really sincerely wish time travel was real. i would go back and hang out in the 20's and 40's. not the 30's though, too dissparate. i wonder if i just used that word right. oh well. my wrist is starting to hurt from typing but i must...keep....going. emma is so funny and small. i wish my phone rang more. i wish i were flying right now, i mean i could go right now, i have keys and all, but ill fly tomorrow. its 6:52....ive only been doing this for ...carry the two.....6 minutes...shit. and now the real song starts. goddamn, another thing i would do with time travel...go see jeff buckley back in new york at sin-e'...and stevie ray vaughan...and jimi hendrix. you have to. you can go back and watch a writer right....the process is too....incognito. plus the result of his work is just as real as it was the day he wrote it...or she wrote it, just to be fair. but the music...there is more to it than just the sounds. emmet price was an awesome prof. he proved that music is as much a physical process as it is audidble. i just mis-spelled that word and then went back and fixed it. and then i typed fized instead of fixed....time check...6:54, almost there. bored yet? wow look at those guitars. scroll up to see what time i started....6:46. born again from the rhythm..singing along. if i go to starbucks do i want to wear my jacket? dont want to know..singing along. wow thats alot of dead folks. i wonder how they died. looks like a war on something. i am watching tv by the way, on mute, with jeff buckley pouring through ma speakers. i wonder if i should mention what im waiting for, although im not reeeallllyyy waiting for anything but i want to be. hmm..a PARADOX almost, if you will. my sinister laugh really isnt all that sinister. i wonder what the hell elissa meant by that. i wonder what dalia is doing, now what are all my friends doing. i should go up there soon. 6:57, almost there. okay, flight plan, i need the IFR chart and a highlighter and my aopa sign in. and five bucks for the hot chocolate. do i want whipped cream? yes i think i do. i wonder if chocolate gives me headaches. i havent really had a headache today but i felt one coming on after i flew so i took some excedrin. apparently i was tailed by the abbie on the way home. weird, i never run into people i know. not that i ran into her....i would have noticed. i wonderhow many people i run into but actually dont notice. i need a radar. a personal radar so i know when im around people i know. that would rock, we can all have transponders. 6:59 holy shit time hurry up. i think too much. apparently. if youre still reading this, ask yourself why? because i have no idea why you would. i sure as shit wouldnt. i should go watch that clip of grace after this. see, im not obsessed with buckley, i just get on these hooks with certain folks, a few weeks ago it was allman bros, today its buckley. i wish they would put out that dvd of amazing grace...whoa heey the x-1. dammit...OHHHH wow today was the day yeager broke the sound barrier. i cant imagine being around at that time. stuff was so new. i want to take some chances and have some adventures. around the world would be good. 7:01.

from the pilot's seat

unless youve been living under a rock today, you've heard that a small plane crashed into a building in nyc. of course, anytime someone goes down its horrible and tragic. after hearing reports about what was going on just prior to the crash, it sounds as though either the pilot (and instructor) were having some real trouble or were being a real asshole. if they were in trouble, it must have been terrifying and i wouldnt wish that upon anyone. i am still completely mystified as to how this could have happened. he took off out of teterboro (northwest of the city) and started down the hudson. go back and look at some of my journal entries...I'VE DONE THIS FLIGHT!!! its not rocket science, its not hard, its pretty simple, you stay over the water. somehow, they crossed the city (flying east) and hit a building on a westerly heading. huh? wah? if there was engine trouble why would you hit a building? there isnt a single place to ditch, except for the river, which is where i would have went. you might not make it, but you wont be killing anyone but yourself. again, i cant sit here and ridicule them for what they did as i have no idea what was going on. its just so unfortunate.
the worst part is the media coverage. anderson cooper started tonights show with "in a post 9-11 world, airplanes can still get this close to new york, leaving many people questioning why. was he experienced enough? we'll discuss this and revisit the jfk jr accident as well, coming up."

holy shit

alright, flying is not dangerous. people can be dangerous when they make bad decisions. every accident that has ever happened probably started happening way before impact, probably even on the ground, while someone was sitting at a desk putting together their flight plan. there are steps that you through to make sure that you are doing everything as safely as possible and you owe it to yourself, your passengers, other pilots in the sky, and any person you fly over on the ground to make sure that you are in fact being safe. when people get complacent or lazy..accident. so anyway, the media has jumped all over this and now for the next month, general aviation is going to be viewed with a skeptics eye. whenever i start talking to a non-pilot about flying i time the conversation to see how long it will take before they mention jfk. its gone anywhere from 5 seconds to 10 minutes, but it always comes up.
i cant wait to see how this is going to effect all of us. no matter what, it wont be good.

Collage o' Crap

i saw this scene on my desk and thought it perfectly captures my job. contents from left to right: paper clips, reinforcement labels, sign here flags, spartan executive, dog biscuit, airplane rivet, excedrin migraine.

Man New Her

alright, im pissed off. ive spent the last few minutes or hours, whatever unit of time youd like to use, reading some dribble that some random folks are spouting off about the world of love and life and blah blah blah blah blah. now, if you were to go back and read some of my entries from years past, youd see that i would be guilty as charged and stand proud amongst the dribblers. id yell "but we are sensitive! and need to make sense of it all! and it is only through using words of grandeur painted on my canvas of melancholy that i can find direction and solitude, bringing color to my otherwise grayscale world!"

it is at this juncture that i would like to interject my new favorite word:

bollocks.

im gonna lay it out for you (use that plurally). get over/off/past it. stop trying to dance around whatever is going through your head. it happened, they left you, you left them, she or he is now licking and sucking on someone else and you can go out and do the same exact thing. and you know what? you will. so stop wasting your time with this aformentioned dribble and do something productive. stop looking for it, let it happen. if you keep on looking for something to happen, youll wake up one day and realize that you just wasted half your life trying to find what was inevitable in the first place. so relax, take a breather, go do something fun. stop trying to wrap your mind around something that youll never be able to wrap your mind around. you can try, but its going to be like that christmas present where you can still see the box on the end where the two sides of wrapping paper dont meet. its a walkie-talkie. see? i just ruined the surprise.
im not trying to be insenstive or anything here folks. ive had enough time to digest the same thing that you are all trying to deal with now. and the best thing i came up with, the most comforting thing i ever said to myself was life goes on. and if you can believe that that is a great thing, youll be all set.