Ten Thousand Feet

Ten thousand feet above sea level is where I feel most at home. Growing up with a pilot as a father has been a catalyst for many unique opportunities. I have known for a while now that flying was my personal pursuit in life, and have been eager to follow this dream. It was never really a question for me, after my father first showed me the inside of the cockpit in a plane I could not stop thinking that it was the most interesting thing to do. How I could not dream of anything better than to be ten thousand feet in the air and flying around, and get the opportunity to do that for the rest of my life.

While other children were at home making hot chocolate and building snowmen during winter break, I was in Amsterdam wandering through the Van Gogh Museum, marveling at his anomalous style and technique. In leiu of tanning I spent the spring in Athens, Greece, lost in ambulatory musings about our disparate cultures. I have been the recipient of many invigorating chances to experience the world and its cultures.

It has been my dream to be a pilot since I was in fifth grade. I oftentimes find myself gazing out at the sky around me, anxious for a future I could spend in the air; a captain of the sky. I have stayed faithful to my dream, with my parents encouraging me to pursue it. On every trip my father takes me to the cockpit and shows me the myriad of charts and checklists he works through before every flight. He has pointed out all the glimmering buttons that surround the small room, and some of their purposes. I now know how to turn on and off all of the lights in the cabin. The walls of my room are covered with posters of flight maps and flight controls. Books on Cessna’s and aviation knowledge line my desk.

             At 5:54PM I stood in the luscious green lawn waiting, adrenalin coursing through my veins, anxiously waiting as my instructor approached me. My first flight was the summer before senior year. The first plane I flew was a Cessna 152. As soon as it took off my feelings were validated: Flying was what I wanted to spend the rest of my life doing. Flying felt so real and at home for me; I loved being able to rise above the clouds and look down into the soft blue of Plymouth Harbor and fly over Plymouth Rock. I was not the only one impressed. My instructor was pleased to see that when it came down to landing the plane and taxiing I already knew what to do. 

After that flight it became irrevocable. Flying is the future that I want for myself.