memories and M&Ms

There is just a twinge in the eastern sky as climb over Waikiki. Mornings are treasures to me, especially mornings on Hawaiian beaches and especially mornings where I meet the sun in the sky. I pulled the gear up then just enjoyed the next few minutes of views of more and more of Oahu followed by the sun’s arrival just beyond another F-117.

Eight hours would take me back to Holloman AFB, New Mexico and the mountains I called home. In the meantime we chatted about skiing, refueled, and did what pilots do on long flights. I looked at the land passing beneath me – the mountains of California, Nevada, Arizona, and finally New Mexico. Towns, roads, and airports we flew over brought back memories. Nellis and various Red Flag exercises and schools; Hoover Dam and road trips to Las Vegas or Phoenix; Sedona and breakfast at the airport there with friends and family; the Grand Canyon and flying into Williams Airpatch; Flagstaff and mountain biking on a snow-less “ski” trip; Payson and flying around Arizona in a Cessna; Soccorro, Enchanted Tower and climbing and camping in the freezing cold.

Two sandwiches, eleven refuelings, two diet Cokes, one slow-feeding fuselage fuel tank, and countless peanut M&Ms later, I joined to Krusty’s wing for the flight up initial for runway 16 at Holloman. I had to apologize to the folks who came out to meet me at the jet that afternoon. I was so tired all I could dream of was a hot shower and bed…yet when Yvonne picked me up, she had to tell me a few things. Like the brakes and transmission leak on the car that needed attention as soon as possible, and the water at the house that smelled terrible – as if there were something in it. I just went to bed, knowing the world would look far better after a good night’s sleep.

Of course it did, and a week later, I could once again drink the non-smelly water in my house, drive the car without fear of losing the brakes, and best of all, I can still climb the hardest of the routes I could do last year. It’s the little things.