I still felt groggy from the early morning hours; I felt as though I had zipped to the airport from my home, with no recollection of the time in between. Slowly drawing in the coffee, I glanced once again through the ground-level window, at the sky gaining light from the sun rising in the opposing East. Coffee was never really something I enjoyed. It was bitter, a drink begging to have relevance in a society of continuously growing sleep deprivation; but generally being on the sleepier side myself, I could never really refute it. But now was no time to be groggy. I raised the lid to my lips once again, a drop of coffee dripping from the cap and onto my pants. Great, I thought. And sipping in the last ounce of java (the bottom portion was always the worst part), I crumpled the foam cup and threw it into the waste-bin to the side of the garage-door-sized window. I looked up once again. It was brighter, certainly, and the wind was calm—the perfect day to fly.

*  *  *
I made my way to the hanger door, checking the time on my watch. 7:30 am. The sun was certainly higher now, but the sight and smell of dawn was still all around. There was a serenity to this. Hearing the faint base clef of a Cessna engine somewhere miles behind, I considered the condition of the plane I was heading to. I could never really say I was afraid of flying. There was a tingling to it, I suppose, but there was a point in my life where it was not such an apprehensive feeling. Now the hangar, which was lit primarily through skylights in the roof, showed rays of creeping sun on the rear of the aircraft. It was a white plane, small, four-seater, a 172 make and model. I had checked the engine the night before; it was looking good. No erosion, no leaks.
"Hey, Anthony!"
I nearly jumped out of my socks, "What? Who?"
"Ha, ha. It's me, Jack. I see you are prepping the plane today?"
"Yeah. I'm going to fly the Hudson route again. The city in the morning is always quite a sight. Any turbulence to look forward to?" I was curious.
"No, it looks good. ATIS is reporting high visibility, winds calm. The air should be fine." The Automatic Terminal Information System, a mere artificial voice that continuously broadcasts on the COM Radios, telling us what we needed to know to fly safely. I pondered how such a monotonous-sounding voice could be so important.
"Wonderful, thanks," I finally responded.
With that, I was back with my own silence and the miniature crepuscular rays. I did my casual walk around. First, in the c***pit, then working my way, counter-clockwise, around the aircraft. Ailerons looked fine, moved freely, as did the elevator and rudder. The shiny white metal beamed a distorted reflection of my face back at me. Years of air pressure and lines of rivets showed the incomplete uniformity of an otherwise smooth aluminum surface. A few gray hairs (something strange, considering I was still young, or so I commonly thought) were shown as I gazed. Onward, the prop was steady, no physical damage. Back in the aircraft, I did a quick run over the controls again. It was time.
I called over Jack to help out with the plane; he was standing just outside the hangar, tending to a clipboard. I disengaged the parking brakes, and we pushed the wing struts, one of us on either side, so that the plane just crept out of the hangar, looking west. "Thanks," I assured.
Getting into the plane, I turned on the battery and alternator. The sounds of the gyro became audible. Its sound was quite unique, perhaps only comparable to the sounds of a coffee maker spooling up. It was an electronic, metallic sort of sound that gradually increased in pitch. When it steadied, I watched as my hand pushed in the throttle rod just 1/4 an inch; then pulling the mixture out as far as I could. I clicked on the Master switch, then the fuel pump. It made a bit of a buzzing sound. I pumped the mixture a little, then turned the fuel pump back off. The engine was ready to start; this moment always exhilarated me. 3 years of flying, and it was always a new sound to me. I looked to the left, just to the bottom of the yoke, and placed the key in the ignition, sliding it in. I twisted the small metal piece clockwise, and the engine hesitated at first. It was as if I was trying to start an old 50s car that had been starved of fuel for some time. But lone and behold, it started... choppy at first, violently vibrating the front of the plane, and then steadily humming forward. I quickly pushed the mixture to full rich (open). It sounded strong and purred with pride, ready to respond to the slighted input of throttle.
Flipping on the avionics, the GPS clicked to life. We were up and running, ready to move. It was just this airplane and I. Air Traffic Control cleared me, and I disabled the parking brakes, eased my foot off of the toe brakes, and push in the throttle so the plane began to slowly accelerate along the cracked up pavement, which was at the point where small patches of grass were growing from the fractures.
The sun was still rising, now, and it struck the concrete in such a way that the dark, withering gray seemed to shine a bright yellowish orange. And the fuselage of the little white Cessna reflected these things, dynamically changing its image as it rattled across the taxiway.
"November four-ninety-five, good to go, runway one-niner," the sudden life of my headset nearly made me jump out of my seat.
"Affirmative, one-niner, November four-ninety-five."
As I began to turn onto the narrow runway (more like an asphalt strip), there was always an exhilaration I experienced, as if I was looking down a road to total freedom. In a way, that's exactly what I was looking at. I noticed the tire marks all along the white markings of the runway, where I, like many others before, had landed, the wheels of their aircraft skidding along the runway for that brief moment, allowing just enough for a black streak and a glance of smoke, before the tires caught up with the speed of the plane.
Now it was time. I slowly advanced the throttle stick, and the plane began to creep forward. The nose pulled up a bit as I was pushed back into my seat. I made sure to counteract the torque-induced rotation (which practically forced the plane to veer left) by inputting rudder with my right foot. I looked at my speed gauge; 30 knots, 35 knots, 40 knots, the time was almost here; 50 knots, 55 knots; I pulled gently back on the control yoke. The plane pitched up, reacted to the crosswind a bit, and the propeller bit smoothly into the air. The wings were cutting flawlessly in this thick air by the ground, hitting small air pockets as it passed over the trees that bordered the perimeter of the airport. I trimmed the nose down a hair to ensure the plane climbed at the proper speed.
I looked to my left. The city was there, in the distance, a gentle haze enveloping it as the pink background began to be dominated by the sun. This was busy airspace, earning the classification "Bravo". Flying around Newark, La Guardia, and Kennedy traffic was truly a hassle to the brain, but was overshadowed by the mystically of the city in the morning. I noticed an airliner miles out climbing thousands of feet out of Newark. It blended in quite well with the terrain... gray on gray. Being more a nature person, one could argue all the gray of buildings and pavement, which proved society's existence on this Earth, was not all that pretty. Even I agreed. It looked like a gigantic fungus infestation if you got to a high enough altitude. But there was a certain rustle-bustle about the swings of the city and suburbs. As I climbed to two, three, four thousand, the inhabitants below me became smaller and smaller. But I could still see everything. The cars, trucks, boats on the Hudson, and all the many people walking through, seemed so intricately planned and executed. It seemed to me like a bizarre ant farm experiment, everybody going about their business, so independently, seemingly insignificant, yet so interconnected. It was a marvelous sight.
But then things went sideways. What a cruel figure of speech that was. Because I realized when I looked forward the plane was actually rolling sideways: 20 degrees, 30 degrees, 40 degrees counterclockwise. I was pushed back into my seat as the nose inherently began to sink with the lack of upward lift. I reached out and just barely grabbed the yoke with my fingers, and attempted to counteract the roll. We weren't stalling, that was certain. The speed was reading at least 100 knots, and I felt myself being pushed backward. The sound of the propeller treble began to increase with our speed.  The plane began to tremor as it approached its speed limit. I quickly glanced outside the window to my left, which gave me a great view of the underside of the port wing. The city I loved was no longer there. The ground was getting closer, closer....
Darkness. The sound of the plane, and the environment around me, suddenly stopped Only small slits of light became visible after a moment. I attempted to move my limbs, but they refused to respond. It felt as if I was in a shell and trying desperately to break out. Suddenly, my body jerked to life, shaken awake. I shook my eyes open. Beams of light had begun to penetrate the curtains. I propped myself up against the headboard, shaken slightly by whatever had just happened. I glanced around and noticed the sereneness of my bedroom. I groggily dragged myself over to the window, and opened the blinds. The sky was blue, and the sound of the morning dove was just barely audible beyond the droplets of dew that had begun accumulating on the grass. A few cirrus clouds skimmed the sky above.
Hmm, I thought, what a perfect day to fly.
After getting dressed, I grabbed a cup of coffee and headed down to the airport.