Sylvia's Journal

Yesterday I was carried by wings, then music and finally by Morpheus. First there was the flying. Weather along our planned route to the south included northern winds gusting from 14 to 28 knots. This is not a huge problem – just hard work – except when the runways are at right angles to the wind and short. This is the case in East Hampton and on Block Island. For a brief moment we contemplated going west to Ticonderoga and fly the length of Lake George. Finally we decided to stick to the initial plan and postpone our decisions to land or not once we were in the vicinity of the airport. We had enough fuel to return without landing.

I took the controls on the way out and Bill was the return pilot. It was a crisp, cold and clear day and you could see for miles. We flew west around Boston and then southwest to Groton and from there crossed the waters to Long Island. On our right was Plum Island which Bill told me we would not want to land, even if we had to. Their website explains why: “We’re proud of our role as America’s first line of defense against foreign animal diseases. We’re equally proud of our safety record. Not once in our nearly 50 years of operation has an animal pathogen escaped from the island.” After reading more I agree with him that a landing in the water would be better. It is the stuff of horror movies.

The airport in East Hampton was deserted except for one jet and a bunch of prop planes. In the summer it gets as busy as Nantucket with jets flying their owners to their summer homes, which we could see from the air with their pools and tennis courts covered for the winter. It is not a place I would want to fly to then. How the jets land on the short runways is a mystery to me. Inside, the tiny terminal looked like an ad from a Better Living magazine, everything painted white, patio furniture, a large flat screen TV with its own channel showing ads for luxury goods; only the fireplace was missing. We paid our fees (it is rare to have to pay fees on small airports like that in the winter), used the facilities, planned our return and headed out again.

On the way back I was a tourist, occasionally doing radio work but mostly taking pictures. We tried to fly straight north to Beverly, requesting permission to fly over Logan but that was denied. Bill has done it once and was anxious to show me, but most of the time air traffic control prefers to have us little guys out of their hair; we are too slow and fly too low. And so we returned west around Boston which allowed for some glorious views east and north, after a brief stop in Taunton.

Seeing the parking lots of the various shopping centers around Boston from the air makes it hard to believe we are in a recession. I think Christmas Shopping has nothing to do with reality and is simply a reflex that has been bred into our genes. And so, even though the North Shore Mall’s parking lot looked entirely full from the air, I could not help myself and went to buy something which took me as long as flying to another state.

Back home I prepared enough of my favorite Dutch winter meal (Boerenkool met worst) for the entire week my. We had an early meal so we could listen to the North Shore Chorus’ annual Christmas concert in Ipswich. It included among others J.S. Bach’s Magnificat in D which is Mary’s prayer – after she learned she was going to have a child that was a little different from others – set to music. It was indeed magnificent. Other pieces were sung by the (rather professional) children’s chorus and made me cry. Some of the tears were from yawning; it was long after my jet lag bedtime and luckily it was a short concert. I was driven home in a semi sleep state and was whisked away on my final journey of the day by Morpheus the moment I put my head on the pillow.