The flight

It rose gracefully, no longer connected to the Earth; It's flimsy wings carried it further upward and from my sight; But I watched it keenly, like a parent watching protectively over its fledgling...Free and unfettered, unburdened by the pull of gravity, it rose and rose skyward...It Flew.

I've had many hobbies over the years, some have endured for most of my adult life and some have come and gone for various reasons; Lack of enjoyment, funds to support it or through not being good enough at it to continue. Hobbies are how I engage with my life though and I focus a lot of my energy on them

Around 2012 I decided I wanted to learn how to fly - More accurately, how to fly a model plane. I'd seen many YouTube videos of really cool remote control planes and I wanted in on the action.

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It sounded like a legitimate hobby and whilst I knew it could be extremely costly it was also possible to be done in a more affordable manner; This is what I had intended to do.

I headed to the hobby shop and chatted with one of the lads there in a bid to determine the right remote controlled plane to get. There was some very cool models there but those ones had extremely large ticket-prices and the chap suggested I start a little more modestly. I decided upon a not so cool looking one that was more affordable, handed over some of the folding stuff and off I went, the proud owner of a remote controlled plane.

One of the reasons I chose that particular plane was for the fact it came with flight simulator software that matched the planes actual controller which was designed to teach new users to fly. I went home, visions of soaring the skies after a few moments of training on the simulator in my mind, and proceeded to get to work.

It was a bit harder than I had at first thought it would be but I started to get the hang of it, learning to react to the variables they threw in and to the controls which required different input depending on which way the plane was going, away or towards me. It's exactly the same principle as flying a real plane of course, all the same dynamics.

I worked at it for hours and hours over the next couple of weeks and did the small amount of assembly required to get the plane ready for flight. Eventually, feeling confident, I headed down to the park where I would finally put into flight my brand new, and reasonably costly, plane.

I chose a location that was free of prying eyes, just in case I fucked it up completely, and set to work getting the pre-flight checks in place. That done, it was go time.

I started the engine, checked the aileron, flaps, rudder and elevators were all working when commanded and gave the engine some revs...It whirred and the propeller spun faster eager to get going...My glorious moment of flight was at hand.

I intended to do a hand-launch rather than a runway launch the first time and as I revved the engine I cast it forth into the wild blue yonder and...

Then things went bad; It stopped flying.

Well, I'll be honest, it was still flying, just in a nose dive directly at the ground at an ever increasing speed.

Of course, not being experienced, I was unable to adjust rapidly enough and arrest the plane from its downward trajectory. I pulled on the levers at the same time as trying to stave off the sickening feeling of doom that was sweeping over me and then...

I walked over to my plane, now a broken mess of wings, fuselage and engine, and observed the catastrophe that once was my beautiful new plane. I picked it up gingerly, thinking I will rebuild you my little winged friend, but ended up taking it home, packing it away and I haven't looked at it since.

Flight had eluded me.

It's now 2020 and my wife Faith asked me about my plane last week.

In truth, she basically said, you remember that time you tried to fly and fucked it up? Something like that.

What she didn't know was that I still had the plane and had, in fact, ordered the parts to rebuild it all those years earlier. I told her as much and she suggested we go and fly it. I looked at her with a healthy degree of scepticism but she insisted on it being something we could do together...Hmm, the last flight lasted about 12 seconds so I'm not sure how satisfying it'll be this time around. 😁

I'm going to get my plane out from my workshop where it's buried on the weekend, take stock of the parts and see what's required to get it fixed; You see, I'm not one to shy away from a challenge and making my wife happy, doing things together with her, is enjoyable for me. We'll rebuild the plane and have another try at flying...It's likely to be a disaster but why not right?

I love having hobbies. Competition shooting, hiking, kayaking, camping, off-roading, reading, blogging, rogaining, writing, researching history, hunting, go-kart racing, Lego, playing American football, furniture and car restoration, antiquing and so on...All things I've done and continue to do at varying levels of skill and success...It's how I engage with life and it's been nothing but rewarding, maybe all except my dream of flight.

How about you?

Comment below, tell me about your hobby, how enjoyable you find it and any funny stories around it like mine above.

Design and create your ideal life, don't live it by default - Tomorrow isn't promised.

Be well
Discord: galenkp#9209

_{My apology for not knowing what community to put this into...I don't think there is a hobby community - Someone should start one.}