At the age of two or three, I flew on a jet. I don’t remember what it was like as my small body travelled through the air, but I am familiar with flying. Since that flight, though I haven’t been on a plane, I have visited the skies on numerous occasions.
I lived in the North: the bridge between earth and sky. When I was little, I remember peering over the edge of my father’s boat on our way home from an evening of fishing. I wanted to look below the dark waters, but when I stared down, I didn’t see water; I was looking into the purple, starry sky. My hair blew gently in the evening breeze and soft waves disturbed the ethereal plane, making the stars dance. I realized that I was flying.
As I grew up, my celestial home became more apparent to me. My mom taught me how to cross-country ski through the white and green woods. When I would fall, I sometimes would sit for a while, watching her as she flew through the forest with the grace and fluidity of a swallow.
In the summer, I spent time fishing, swimming, and running. When out on the lake with my dad, I would sit on the cool, metal bench and watch him expertly cast his lure into the open waters. My spirits flew with the lure, hoping it would land a fish.
As I slid into the lake after an evening sauna, I was embraced by the starry sky as it appeared on the water I floated in. I swam in constellations and was wrapped in the great arms of the Milky Way.
In Autumn, I ran through the same decrepit logging roads that I would soon be skiing on. My bursting lungs threatened to pick me up off the ground, but I was already there—there in the pale blue sky above and around me.
My flight ended abruptly when I moved down south in grade four. I felt deflated as our van left the treetops behind and began to pass one flat field after another. Our unseeded yard was cracked and desert-like for the first summer. I longed to return to the skies once more, but nothing in the South seemed to take me there. I tried to fly on skis, but the ground didn’t let me glide; I cast lures, yet there was nothing to hope for; I looked for the sky in the water, but it was too murky; I ran cross-country, but the air was heavy. I couldn’t fly.
Returning to the North in grade ten, I was happily reunited with the sky; although, I soon discovered there is a cost to flying. You will be alone. An eagle does not have any friends, the tallest of trees are the loneliest, and the stars live lightyears apart. I learned to delight in the sound of wind in the trees and the eerie echo of a loon’s call.
It’s not a bad thing to end up grounded—for a time. We realize our roots when sitting in the dust. But why sit when you could fly? And oh, I flew; I soared over the deep, cut through the clouds of snow, and I touched the heavens.
I lived in the North.
