When first you have tasted flight...

Tris's third flight
Karen in the air
Tris before his launch.

On Thursday I and I presume the rest of the family who particpated --Tristan, my biological son, and Karen, my ex, experienced a transformative experience.

We went hang-gliding. And now I understand da Vinci's quote about longing to return. Once I got off the ground, that magical instant when a flailing, running toe swipes at the earth and misses... when the heavy thing you have on your shoulders all of a sudden becomes part of you and effortlessly lifts you into the air... It is addictive and I want my next fix.

There is... in fact... another lesser transformation. When the tow rope goes slack and it's all you. Or rather you and the glider but it feels like all you.
My third flight. Video by Karen Wehrstein

I have felt lighter on my feet ever since.

Homesick for the Sky

The wings my soul has dreamed of, enmeshed in clay, now manifest in lofting silence.
words drift away, thistledown in the wind.
There is only the wind.
a bubble of laughter in my chest.
The name of joy is flight and oh, thank the gods I have met her
been introduced.

Fleeting moments in the presence of the sky
cradled in the wind's hand, let me kiss it again
pull me up out away from where my feet press too hard
upon the earth.

too happy for tears then
tears now... homesick for the sky.