I've never really been sure if I'm just incredibly lucky, or if my perspective is skewed so much that everything just seems amazing. I figure, if you're not happy with where you are, what you have, what you are doing, changing any of the above is probally not going to help. It's still you. Outlook and perspective is everything. It's the only thing you have any semblance of control over. I'm telling myself this as I sit bored to tears in my tiny room. Mosquitoes are still getting under my net every night, and there's these little flea things crawling around in the bed that often wake me. Everything doesn't seem so amazing today. But tomorrow I fly again.
This touring gig is great for rejigging one's perspective. When I first got settled into a job in Northern Turkey, along the Black Sea Coast, it was an eye opener. These people are not rich by any North American standard, but I have yet to meet friendlier, happier people. I thought Canada's East Coast was friendly. Not anymore. At least not by Turkey's standard. It was so nice seeing entire families out for a seaside walk; Moms, Dads, grandparents, kids, the teenagers as well, walking and socializing, and hours upon hours of backgammon over tea. Nobody wanted anything from you, they were just happy to see you, happy to help you in whatever it was that you happened to be doing, sporting a warm, honest smile all the while. I absolutely loved Turkey. I spent a year on that coast. My priorities got abit of a shift. Africa is shifting it again.
When the family first plunked everything down on Canada's East Coast, it was a new beginning. Everyone we had ever met that had ever called Canada's East Coast home were a special breed. Easy going, never taking themselves too seriously, down to earth, they were just relaxed, and we were not disappointed when we finally arrived. It's still home, and it'll probally be home until I stop breathing. The flying? Absolutley amazing! In Northwestern Ontario flying emergency medical flights, I'd been an IFR rated pilot for a decade, which basically means I was flying larger twin engine helicopters in a two crew, Captain/Co-pilot enviroment, in pretty much any weather, day or night. You didn't need to see where you were going, you used the instruments. But the weather wasn't all that bad, and the majority of your real IFR flying was at night, just because there were no lights in the far North to provide any visual references. But Canada's East Coast? They had real "weather". We're talking fog. Thick fog. 1/8 of a mile visibilty in forty-five knots of wind fog. Now we're talking! There's a challenge to get you out of bed in the morning.
I remember that first East Coast flight. It was still dark, the rain was coming down almost sideways in a forty-five knot gale, and the old S61 was buffetting left and right as we taxied out for take-off. The visibility might of have been 1/4 mile, and the ceilings were maybe a hundred feet, and I was having a hard time getting my head around the idea of heading to an offshore platform two hundred miles out into the North Atlantic in this shit. But take-off we did. We weren't a few seconds in the air and it was straight to the dials, hand flying this twenty thousand pound beast on tiny instruments as we bucked and bounced and rattled and shook, and climbed, and climbed through the driving rain. We turned left, heading out to sea, watching the temperature and hoping we broke out on top before the ice started to accumulate, but it started to brighten, more and more, and as we neared our cruising altitude we busted out of the cloud tops into the most glorious sunrise I have ever seen. I'll never forget that sunrise. That bright morning sun quickly heated the cold cockpit and the ride smoothed out and it was as near to perfect as things have ever been. Of course nearly two hours later we dropped back into the goo to find the rig, but that was a memorable flight.
This I did for eleven years.
I think I'll walk down to the beach, look at some carvings, maybe buy one today. There's not a cloud in the sky and there's a fresh breeze keeping the temperatures relatively mild. It's not a bad gig.
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