The addiction of Flying

Hey fellow birdmen, here's a short piece I wrote and posted over at
Rec.aviation.homebuilt. Any comments are appreciated.

The Buzz of RAH

You see there were eleven of them in all and they really had nothing
in common. The engineers, the builders, the dreamers, the weekend
warriors, the curious outsiders, and even the high flyers,
unsatisfied with having done it just the week before. But there were
more in the shadows. Many more. And this is where they would come
to find out about it so they could get their weekly fix. They spoke
in a kind of code and they talked about getting high all the time.
You see they were addicts. They were hopeless pathetic addicts. And
they could not be rehabilitated. Eleven little Indians hooked on the
intoxicating elixir of forcing their bodies into a state of utter
euphoria. Taking their bodies where they should not.

And it was dangerous. Most every young man wanted to get some at some
time in his life. And some paid with their very lives. They believed
in the dream. Some built the apparatus for it right in their garage
because they believed in the dream. And then something went wrong and
their friends had to say goodbye to them.

They were breaking the law. Newtonian Law as it was known all the
way up to 1900. This was a new drug. It was really only a rumor
until 1903. Then it became believable and hit mainstream. And it was
good. It was just as good as falling in love. You never forgot your
first hit. You never forgot that feeling that you had conquered the
whole world, and you never forgot the look on people's faces after you
did it that first time by yourself. They could see the glow on your
face. They could see you were slightly smiling to yourself doing
mundane chores that you always did. They could see something had
changed in you for the better but they weren't sure what it was and
they had this quizzical look on their faces. They noticed it
everywhere you went... as you ran your errands, as you went to work,
as you said hi to your neighbor and stopped to pet a dog that you did
not like.

And they were right. Something was going on with you and there was no
way for you to hide it. Music sounded better to you. Food tasted
better. You found pleasure in everything you did. Life was good. It
was good to be alive with your little secret:
Your feet had left the ground that week with only you as the master of
your fate. And here you were walking and talking to mere mortals a
few days later, who had no idea where your soul had been soaring. You
would forever savor that feeling and spend the rest of your life
hoping to do it again.

pacplyer


( I hope some of you liked it.)