I sit in the cockpit going over my pre-flight checklist – flaps, rudders, all the things that I need to make sure are working to be safe in the air. What it took to get on this plane was longing to do something I have wanted to do my entire life. What kept me out was a trauma.
When I was young, I admired my older brother more than anything. Coming from a broken family you move around a lot – our summers with Mom, our winters with Dad. Dad moved a lot because of work, so every time my brothers and I stayed with him, it was in a new state. My two brothers and I became remarkably close because of that. My older brother, in my eyes, was the most stable rock in my world.
My father was a good man, but when you are raised like a gypsy, you become closer to your siblings than your parents. We were also raised free-range, so with the right spices we should cook up well. Free-range gypsy stew. Yum!
The one unique thing my father had was an airplane. It was a little Cessna that he would take us up in for fun, and sometimes to visit our mother when we lived close enough to Reno. My brother Danny, who was five years older than me, started taking flying lessons at 14 and had joined the Civil Air Patrol because of this influence. Once he was in the air it was impossible to get him out of it.
READ THE FULL ARTICLE BY JOHN CASH FILIPPE IN THE 2022 WINTER EDITION OF GAMING & LEISURE MAGAZINE.