Have I mentioned that I hate flying? Over the
years I've tried it drunk, sleep deprived and
otherwise subdued, but the result is always
the same - abject fear. Actually, that's not
quite true. In the early 1990s, following my
first few ventures skyward, I gained an
unexpected measure of confidence. The flights
thus far had been remarkably smooth, the
on board entertainment distracting and terror
minimal. Then, on perhaps my third or fourth
trip out to visit my cousin in New York, I
experienced one of
those flights. Constant,
violent, turbulence, akin to driving in a
car, without suspension, over endless
sleeping policemen, at full pelt, for about
seven hours. There were tears, there was
screaming, there was upchucking a gogo - and
that was just the cabin crew.
Two weeks later, I was all set to fly home
alone and found myself sitting next to a
lovely old lady who was heading back to
blighty after visiting her Daughter and
meeting her Grandchild for the first time. We
got chatting as the plane queued for a take-
off slot and she told me how she'd
experienced a new lease of life since the sad
death of her husband, who hadn't really liked
to travel. She'd flown to several European
destinations over the previous couple of
years, before taking on the long haul to
America and found that she absolutely loved
it. In fact she'd actually been flying around
the States alone for over a month, before
stopping in on her Daughter for the last ten
days of her trip. She was 75 if she was a day
and a quite remarkable lady.
I expressed my admiration for her
achievements and somewhat shamefacedly
mentioned the flight from hell that I'd
endured two weeks earlier, which had left me
an emotionally drained wreck for the first
few days of my holiday. At this very moment
the Captain's voice came over the intercom to
inform us that we'd been cleared for take-off
and the plane began to roll forwards. 'I just
don't like flying...', I said '...and I
particularly hate this bit' I muttered. As
the engines roared and we began to hurtle
down the runway, the old lady smiled and gave me a reassuring tap on the back of my hand, which
clenched the arm rest with a vice like grip
of pure fear. She then uttered the most ill-timed and least helpful phrase it's ever been
my misfortune to hear. 'Don't worry young
man, there's nothing we can do about it. If
it's your time to go, it's your time to go'.
The wheels left the ground. We were on our
way home.
Here, from the 1975 LP 'Musical Bones', are
The Upsetters, featuring the mighty trombone
of Vin Gordon, with 'Fly Away'.
