Thank you, Mrs. Adams

Mrs. June Adams, our teacher, was at the front of our classroom on a hot spring day. We were all eager for summer vacation to start and Mrs. Adams was running out of regular subjects to cover. To pass the time for the last hour or so of school she brought out a model airplane, the kind used in flight schools by flight instructors. She started by saying she wasn’t a pilot and knew very little about airplanes or flying but thought this little model was interesting and we might like to see it. She pointed out the little that she knew—the nose, tail, wings. She showed us the little flippy things on the wings called ailerons. “They make the airplane turn,” she said. Then the elevator on the back, which made the nose point up and down. “And these other things on the wings are called flaps,” she said. “They both go down but I’m not sure just what they do.” And that was about the extent of her knowledge. She then told a story about how she went flying once with her grandfather in a Piper Cub and he landed in a grass field, but suddenly added a whole bunch of power, went back up in the air to avoid a fence he hadn’t noticed, then landed on the other side!

For me, my half-closed eyes were now fully open. My imagination was like a pile of the finest kindling waiting for a spark. The next day I asked Mrs. Adams more questions about the flaps and just how the airplane moves when they come down. She said she didn’t know, but suggested I go to the library. I bicycled up to our local library and looked for the airplane section. From books, to spending Saturday mornings with my friend Mark, building our Revell airplane models, my interest grew from spark to fire.

Fast forward to 2020, when I reached the magic age of 65 and retired as a Washington, D.C.-based Airbus captain for American Airlines, flying out of Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.

I was first a flight instructor, then spent seven years with the “commuters” (they weren’t called regionals back then), and then 34 years with Eastern, US Airways, and American. I feel so grateful for the wonderful career I have had and the many terrific people I have worked with. I retired one day, and the miseries that plague all crewmembers in the airline industry—onerous scheduling, commuting, battles over compensation, and job security (all the bad stuff)—disappeared, but shining through are the good memories, enough to fill chapters.

I was a “shuttle guy.” From the Boeing 727 to the Embraer 190 and Airbus 319/320. I loved flying the northeast shuttle. Boston, LaGuardia, Washington, and Philly. It was fast paced, lots of takeoffs and landings. Many approaches in all sorts of varied weather conditions to airports that each had their unique challenges. I enjoyed the craziness. Mostly flying the shuttle, with an occasional West Coast trip was my dream schedule each month. The flight crews, mechanics, gate agents, and dispatchers were my friends and we worked together. Controllers—those familiar voices each day—all did a terrific job when things got messy like they often did on the shuttle. I guess in the marine or medical field it would be equivalent to being a tugboat captain or an emergency room physician. Just trying to get a taxi clearance from LaGuardia ground control on a busy Friday afternoon weather day requires its own special skill that can only be learned by experience. It was fun.

With not many months left until my mandated retirement, we were holding (again) at Providence. The weather was horrible, thunderstorms blocking many routes, and ATC was doing their best to move traffic. It was bumpy, and our expected hold time had been extended twice. The weather in Boston had required the airport to change runways several times. Our fuel was becoming a concern. A typical high-stress environment. My first officer grinned and said. “You’re going to miss this.”

He was right.

Many crew members can’t wait to get out of the business and never look back. I didn’t want to retire and can’t stop looking back.

Mrs. Adams may not have been a pilot, but she sure knew how to light a fire.

Timothy Blegen is a retired airline pilot living in Sagamore Beach, Massachusetts.