The recession would eventually bottom out, and it would obviously take several more years for the excess amount of space to be absorbed. In any event, I’d had enough. It was time to go.

I lifted off Islip Runway 33 with full fuel, after having filed an instrument flight plan to Canada. The Canadians require you to take a rifle when you fly over remote areas, not to protect you from wild animals – although that’s what you might think – but rather to be able to shoot game if you went down. I liked the idea anyway. Who the hell knows what I’d run into?

I took complete camping gear: small propane cook-stove, fold-up saw, waterproof matches, sleeping bag (my whole senior year at Middlebury I slept in one; I hated to make my bed,) freeze-dried food, a couple of those silver survival blankets, a bottle of scotch. And personal stuff.

I had decided to make my first fuel stop in Wisconsin. Not in a big city, but in a town with a seaplane base as well as standard facilities for landplanes. I wanted to renew my seaplane rating. Why seaplanes? I was going to Alaska; more seaplanes there than anywhere else.

Wausau. That fit. Wausau of the insurance company ads: the train station in the background, stability, and continuity.

Because the weather was CAVU and the forecast good all the way to Wausau, I chose to fly direct, utilizing GPS – Global Positioning System – navigation.

"I’d appreciate flight following," I requested from Clearance, "GPS direct Wausau, Wisconsin. Altitude ten thousand, five hundred."

"Roger, three-five-five Hotel Mike, have a good trip."

There are times when I feel as though I’ve been invited into the halls of the gods, to share the magnificence of the ethereal, ever-changing skies, and to disconnect from my fellow human creatures. I felt at peace, as I often do when I’ve lifted myself through the gravities that hold me so tightly to earth’s realities.

After western Pennsylvania, the ridges of the Piedmonts curled in parallels, pushed together as if by some giant kicking up from under the land. The flattening terrain between the ridges was filled with farms stretched into green squares and rectangles. En route, charts provided specifics for navigation and visual references like highways and railroads, rivers and lakes, airports, cities and towns. I watched the land passing underneath, as if on a magic carpet.

I flew through two time zones; the winter of my losses channeled further and further back into memory.

"Five Hotel Mike, you are twelve miles from Wausau. Report airport in sight, or switch to their frequency, one twenty-two point eight.

"Roger, Minneapolis. Unicom frequency one twenty-two point eight. Thanks a lot for your help. Hotel Mike."

Wausau Unicom reported a Piper J-3 Cub in the landing pattern and an Ultra light nearby. Terrific. These guys had no radios. I slowed down from 190 knots to 120. Where the hell were they, especially the Cub that was somewhere in the traffic pattern?

"Wausau traffic, I’m a Cessna 414 Chancellor. I’ll slow down as much as I can and also enter a wide left downwind."

"Yeah, that should help, Mister," was the reply from the ground. "The pilot flying the Cub doesn’t bother much with other planes."

I could just imagine some rachety old coot they had to lift into the plane, get his feet on either side of the stick and on the rudders, then scream out "Contact!" when they pulled the prop. Old planes didn’t have starters.

I made the proper announcement: "Twin Cessna, left downwind, Runway three-three." Where were those little putt-putts?

"Hurrah for you," came a snappy voice from the Cub. "Try to land that thing without busting up a gear, okay? We don’t like having to fix up those fancy machines."

"No worries, friend," I replied. "I suppose she lands the same as my jet fighter used to. Maybe a touch slower. You sure you got five miles of runway?" I teased. "Looks a wee bit smaller from out here."

"Well, hotshot, if you fly as good as you talk, we’ll see you on the ground. Otherwise, we notify your next of kin."

"All right, Admiral," I said. "You’re on. Twin Cessna on final." I greased in the landing, knowing I was being observed by the locals. As I taxied to the FBO, the fixed base operator, I saw the Cub come straight in, no downwind or base, just straight on in. In a non-controlled airport such as Wausau’s, it was not illegal. Just a little worrisome.

I waited the three and a half minutes after landing for my engine turbochargers to cool, then secured the controls, noted the Hobbs time, opened the split door, watched the ladder fall, and the steps open up. That pilot flying the Cub, should I give them a hand lifting him out?

The Cub’s split panels opened. I saw someone in a flying suit swing out in one liquid motion. So, it wasn’t an old pappy. In fact, it wasn’t a he at all, but a tall, lithe she. She strode over as I was putting on the pitot tube covers, then shook her long, dark hair as she removed her cap and headset. It fell into straight lengths about her shoulders.

"Pretty swanky machine you have there," she said for openers. "I bet she goes a mite faster than my Cubbie." She stood an erect fix six, plus or minus, and despite the bulk of her one-piece flight suit, I divined a lovely figure. My guess was she was in her mid- to late thirties.

"I watched that soft three-point landing of yours. A real beauty. How long you been punching holes in the sky?"

Her skin was light, but her features contained hints of more than one culture. As I knew when her almond-shaped eyes met mine.

"Since my mother flew me here from Alaska. She was a WAF in the Second World War. Ferried every kind of plane under creation. She also instructed any number of wet-eared cadets who almost always insisted on ground-looping their Stearmans. Did you know the Russians used women fighter pilots extensively? They flew those old 1930s biplanes and knocked out plenty of Nazi fighters in combat and bombers on the ground. Gutsy women, wouldn’t you say?" There was a challenge in the way she framed her question.

"Uh, huh," was my eloquent response.

She stuck out her hand. I took it. Her grip was strong and firm.

"Martin," I said. "Henry Martin."