Things change. I didn’t become a pilot. I don’t miss not being one. Not too much, anyway. I know there is a world of difference between the romance of flight as seen through a young boy’s eyes and the hard work of flying as performed by grown men and women. Some part of me still wishes I could fly.

“Wing?”

It was my son, offering me a chicken wing.

“Sure. Thanks.”

I took one off the plate and looked back out the window.
< br/>Orville and Wilbur, those bicycle mechanics from Ohio, are the focus of celebrations for lifting man off the ground at Kill Devil Hills 100 years ago on December 17, 1903.

In all the hoo-ha, I don’t suppose there’s been a lot said in praise of airports.

But on this Sunday, in this airport, we watched the planes take off. And the sight took me back to the feeling of awe that washed over me as a little boy, of watching them speed across the tarmac and soar into the sky, past the horizon.

A part of me almost felt like waving.