He said he was interested. So we made it happen.
On an adventure during the Covid pandemic we stopped at an airfield one day and watched a couple of Cessnas take off and land. My then three-year-old kept remarking about how he wanted to “learn how to drive one of those planes”. And so I excitedly began to build a lesson plan around that for him.
We went to an aeuronautics museum. I talked to them about my three-year-old getting lessons. They shook their head.
Undeterred but not sure if this could actually happen, I made some calls.
Finally one flight instruction school talked it over and agreed that they’d teach him about airplanes and flying and then take him up.
I was nervous that he would get scared. That he would lose it when we were up in the air. Truth was, I was more scared that I would: I get vertiginous quickly when up high. I asked the pilot about this and he said you’re either born with that, or you’re not. I just don’t have the same thing. Concentrate on the horizon, you’ll be fine. So I did.
And my son? Loved it. Fearless. Excited.
We flew over our city, over Red Rocks, over our house and then landed safely in the airport.
Lesson of this story: listen to your kids and then don’t take “no” for an answer. There’s a wild thing inside all of us and there’s a way to express it.
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