AOPA Pilot Magazine - March 2015 - 78

"Do you really expect me to just sit
here?" she said. "I learn by doing.
Not by sitting."
SELF-PRESERVATION

Mom became the first pilot in our
family when, in 1968, she earned
a private pilot certificate in a
Cessna 150. Her motivation was
self-preservation.
My dad, an eye surgeon, was
threatening to learn to fly at that
time, and he had a fantasy about loading his wife and four children into an
airplane for trips throughout the
West. Mom, a physical education
teacher, was the pragmatic spouse,
and she dutifully learned so that she
could back him up.
Dad never fulfilled his flying
ambitions, and Mom discovered she
really liked aviation. Her unflappable
demeanor and hawklike hand/eye
coordination made her well suited
for it. Two years later they divorced,
however, and flying was pushed
aside as Mom worked fulltime while
raising four boys. Eventually, she
remarried-this time to an aerospace engineer, John Melville-and
her interest in flying was rekindled.
My stepdad built a Rutandesigned Vari-Eze in our garage,
and Mom did much of the fiberglass work. They flew it for the first
time in 1978, and then travelled all
over the country. She was the pilot.
He was the navigator, flight engineer, and crew chief. In the early
1980s they bought a partnership in
a Bonanza, and eventually stopped
flying when that airplane was sold.
They were a team for 33 years
until John died from cancer in 2003.
Three years after that, Mom decided
to jump back into flying, a move that
surprised me because flying seemed
likely to flood her with memories of
78 | AOPA PILOT March 2015

her late husband, traveling companion, and biggest cheerleader.
When we met in Tulsa and
inspected the RV-10, it became clear
to me how much she had relied on
him. The airplane itself was exceptionally well built and documented.
But as the builder and I pored over
details of the avionics, electronic
ignition, and standby electrical system, Mom drifted off.
"These are the kinds of things
that John used to take care of," she
said. "I'll learn them, eventually, but
not all at once and not today."
At dinner, we discussed the next
day's departure for California. The
weather forecast was good and
headwinds were mercifully light.
True to form, Mom had a plan. She
wanted to buzz around Tulsa, get the
feel of the airplane by landing at a
number of local airports, and then
log some hood time. I listened for a
few minutes before slipping into my
autocratic flight instructor role.
I told her we weren't going to
waste a good weather window making circles over Oklahoma. We would
fly west in a straight line and make as
few takeoffs and landings as possible.
This was a ferry trip. We'd concentrate on flight training once she got
home. Mom doesn't change plans
easily, but she swallowed hard and
went along.
FAMILY LORE

I filed an IFR flight plan for the next
day's trip so that Mom could get some
practice being in the ATC system. I
was in the right seat and made our
first takeoff at the narrow strip where
the RV-10 was based, then immediately handed over the controls to

Mom and checked in with ATC. I
was impressed with the smooth but
firm way she handled the controls.
Once we leveled off at our assigned
altitude of 8,000 feet, I asked her to
engage the autopilot while I made
notes about engine settings, temperatures, and performance.
"How about I do some turns,
climbs, and descents to get the feel
of the airplane?" she said. We were
already radar identified and on an
active IFR flight plan.
"How about doing what I ask you
to do?" I answered with an edge that
surprised us both. "Please, just hold
8,000 feet."
I was still making notes 12 minutes into our flight when Mom
chimed in again.
"Do you really expect me to just
sit here?" she said. "I learn by doing.
Not by sitting."
ATC offered a shortcut but we'd
have to climb to 10,000 feet to get
it. Mom assured me she could cope
with the thin air.
"I just had a physical and the
doctor told me my blood oxygen
level is excellent," she said. I patted her on the shoulder and told her
to climb to 10,000, where she hand
flew for a few minutes before engaging the autopilot.
This would be a four-hour-plus
leg, so I decided to forgo snacks and
drinks while Mom dug right into her
goodie bag. "I've got raisins, Cheese
Nips, and-check this out," she said.
"Chocolate chip cookies."
Family lore has it that my mom
was painfully shy during her youth,
but she's been overcompensating for
it during the five decades I've known
her. As she's aged, she's become
more forceful, and she swears like
a soldier. When I asked what she
thought of her new airplane, she
said, "It's sure not a bleeping 172!"
And when she dropped a pen, she
filled the intercom with a blistering
string of profanity.
I'm no prude, but I prefer
succinct, even terse, cockpit communications limited to the tasks at hand.
AOPA Pilot Magazine - March 2015

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