This article was published in the Globe and Mail on July 27, 2001 Flying is about striking a balance between freedom and caution, learning how to temper exhilaration with patience. By Kelly Graham. There's a certain routine that my father and I observe on the weekends when I travel north from Toronto to cottage country to visit my parents. Immediately upon arrival, I greet the parents, make a huge fuss over the dog, fix a snack and settle into a comfy chair. I offer up new developments in my work and personal life and they do the same. Only after the appropriate pleasantries have been exchanged will Dad oh‐so‐nonchalantly pose the question for which we've both been waiting. "Well, do you suppose we should go down and exercise the plane?" Invariably I remark on what a fine idea that is and off we go to the family cottage on a lake a few kilometers away where sits a Cessna 172 float plane. It is in his plane, and a succession of others like it, that my Dad taught me about flying and about life. Like my Dad, airplanes have always been an important part of my life, but one I too often took for granted. One of my earliest memory is driving out to a remote farmer's field in Bexley Township, where it was my job to chase cows off the runway while Dad started an old Aeronca Chief by winding its propeller by hand. It always puzzled me when my childhood friends got excited about a plane ride ‐ flying was just something that Dad did. As a teenager, I flew with him only occasionally, usually feeling as though I was indulging him by participating in something he enjoyed. He would always offer to let me take the controls, to try my hand at it guiding the machine he revered, but I was rarely interested. More interesting was the cachet my Dad's plane lent me with my friends and boyfriends. Dad showed up at many a summer barbecue and spent the afternoon taking up my friends before I kissed him brightly on the cheek and waved him off into the sunset.
I can't exactly put my finger on the moment when everything changed for me. During my mid‐ twenties, like many people, I weathered a few very difficult years emotionally. When I got myself together again, learning to fly had somehow become an inevitability. And, just like he had always been, Dad, was there. Few people who don't have a pilot's licence can truly appreciate how much work it takes to get your wings. Dad and I spent countless nights at the kitchen table studying air law, poring over maps, plotting practice journeys and calculating ground speed, weight and balance and fuel burn. He was at the airport when I did my first solo flight. He praised my "decision‐making" when I had to overshoot the runway on my first approach and didn't even comment on how the plane bounced three times when I finally landed it. A few months later, when I failed to find the Burlington Airport during my first cross‐country flight he confided that he suspected the "bugger was hiding" on me. After I became licensed on wheels, I began my training on floats in earnest. Float flying was my Dad's forte and it was a whole new, very difficult, ball game. Hour after hour, weekend after weekend, for months on end, we did endless circuits. At times, the frustration I felt was unbearable. I wanted to scream when, once again upon landing, Dad had to take the controls to prevent a stall 10 feet off the water. And Dad did scream ‐ more than once. "Power!" he would yell when I settled into a landing attitude high too above a glassy surface. "Rotate!" was the cry when I appeared to be heading into the water nose first. He had to yell, I should explain. You see, he always waited until the very last second to give me the opportunity to do everything myself. Any Dad who is willing to let his daughter get him that close to a watery grave, needs to know that the necessary command to arrest the situation will be heard loud and clear. Dad always felt bad about yelling anyway, though, especially after we were safely down and I assured him that I had been just about to add power or rotate as the case may have been. "I probably should have given you another second",he would say. "I'm afraid I'm not a very good teacher."
But that's where he was wrong. Sure, he turned out a pretty damn good pilot, but my Dad taught me so much more than that. His unending confidence that the girl who nearly failed Grade 10 math could master the physics of navigation taught me that nothing was beyond my grasp. His insistence on mastery through repetition taught me to slow down and discover patience that I never knew I had. His ability to spot a moose at 500 feet taught me to never stop taking time to marvel at the world around me. The older I get the more I realize that some of the most poignant moments of my life have been spent in the front seat of an airplane with my father. There are certain things that are easier to say while you're navigating the winds, far above the minutiae of the world below. There are certain things that can be left unsaid yet still somehow understood. I remember years ago flying over the homestead of a family member who, at the time was estranged. "God how I love that land," Dad said. And I just patted his shoulder. "He loves you too, Dad". Flying, my Dad has taught me, is like life. It's about striking a balance between freedom and caution. It's about learning how to temper exhilaration with patience. It's about hard work, discipline, thoughtfulness and respect. And it's about those moments when you think your heart will burst from the sheer beauty and the wonder of what you see around you. Thank you, Dad, for teaching me how to fly.