Sunsets
On the way back from Lake Elmo I went well North of Minneapolis airspace and went up to 6500, then 8500, then 10500.
There was a broken cloud layer between each of those altitudes and the sunset between each layer was awesome, surreal and un-earthly.
Reds on purples on deepest blues, unimaginable shapes and combinations of dim and bright, with no universe seen above and no earth seen below.
It was peace of mind to know if I got stuck I could call air traffic control to request an instrument approach and descend safely through the clouds.
But I didn’t have to, because as I made my way back home the floor below me offered a disconnected maze of holes just large enough to glide through,
followed by another floor of holes and then another floor of holes, the final seconds of sunset lighting my way back to earth through the maze,
finally breaking out to see the lights of cars streaming along highways, and lonely porch lights of country homes, and somewhere down there were my friends and family.
During those kinds of flights I am humbled that I have been allowed in this life to experience it, and I realize out of the millions and millions of
Twin Cities gravity-bound, earth-constrained, soul-searching wanderers, I am only one of a few hundred who could even have the opportunity,
likely only one of a half dozen who experienced that proximal sky, and surely the only one who was given witness to precisely that stream of space and time.
It is a mix of emotions, melancholy and grateful at the same time.
~ December 1, 2013