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Gear Up: On Tenterhooks

A flight that left me in a state of “suspense or agitation in anticipation of a future event.”

There’s a line of weather, tops to Flight Level 450, directly in the path of the proposed flight. It extends a good 500 miles to the left of course and 300 to the right. The thunderstorms reach from Illinois to South Texas. I’m waiting for two people, whom I’ve never met, to join me in flying our Cheyenne from Oklahoma City to Tampa, Florida. At 25,000 feet, our airplane will be about halfway up the mountain of weather. I’m feeling uncomfortable.

This flight seems like a metaphor for other pending events. There was only a handful of objectives before me in this new life of leisure called retirement.

Last winter I sought to put to final rest my anxiety about the increased pressure in my left eye; to qualify as an FAA designated aviation medical examiner; to renew my own medical certificate; to sell our Cheyenne; and to buy a new (to us) airplane, preferably a jet. How hard could that be? Not hard at all, I reasoned, nor should it take long.

Well, my experience so far is that things slow down in retirement. When I was actively practicing cancer surgery, I used to marvel at how patients and their families would take the whole day just to come see the doctor. Now I understand.

When it took a good friend of mine almost a year to sell his magnificent boat, I was puzzled. Now I get it. Today, as I pace back and forth in the FBO, I hear that my passengers’ airline flight is delayed by the same weather I am dreading. In fact, I see it building every time I check the Nexrad image. I have become a man accustomed to waiting.

I’m in Oklahoma City after finishing a week of AME training, which I enjoyed far more than I had anticipated. I met some friends, one of whom was an ophthalmologist, and I learned some things. I reacquainted myself with the eye, its rods and cones, and learned why my first-class medical certificate was a “special issuance.” More than 50 years ago I was hit in the eye with a squash ball, a hard rubber sphere not too much smaller than the kind used in racquetball but way denser. I lost vision in that eye immediately, and could see nothing but blood when I looked at the bad eye in the mirror with my good eye. I was a college freshman and had just discovered how charming young women could be. The eye healed itself over time.

Half a century later, high pressure was discovered in my left eye, probably as a result of the injury long forgotten. This condition, regardless of cause, is called glaucoma, and it is something the FAA takes very seriously. Though the pressure in my eye was reduced with a variety of eye drops and my “visual fields” were stable, my ophthalmologist recommended a second opinion as to whether I should undergo a trabeculectomy, a procedure designed to relieve intraocular pressure. When I Googled this operation, it looked barbaric — in fact, it has been an accepted procedure for over a hundred years. I imagined it to be a refined hot poker to the eye.

I’m fretting about this, wondering about the effects on my first-class medical, watching thunderstorms grow in the Midwest in springtime. The AME course was straightforward, but I haven’t seen my result for the final exam, and it will be weeks before I hear about being designated. More low-grade worry.

The sale of our faithful airplane has been more emotionally trying than I thought. I dearly love the airplane; so does my wife, Cathy, but it is 38 years old, and if I’m ever going to own a more capable airplane, now is the time. We’ve had some nibbles, but it’s a unique airplane, what with its great avionics and excellent maintenance. In fact, the folks coming to Oklahoma City are prospective buyers, whom I have invited to see for themselves what a great airplane she is. When I made the invitation, I did not imagine the wall of weather I’m looking at now.

My Part 135 flying experience has helped me prepare the airplane for this trip. I am all hospitality. I have secured a bottle of white wine and put it on ice. I have made sure there’s a corkscrew on board. The airplane is clean. I don’t usually allow eating and drinking on board, but this is a sales flight, after all. I figure that either I will spend three days in Dallas with people I don’t know, or we’ll make it through the weather. After that, we’ll see about a sale.

Todd and Beth arrive, and I pick them up at the airline terminal and drive them to the FBO. The sky is clear, but the wind is whipping out of the south at 22 knots and gusting to 36. Luckily, this is pretty much right down the runway. This is normal for Oklahoma. There is little question about the energy involved in this weather event. The Weather Channel is loving it.

After takeoff, we’re given a heading direct to the Paris VOR. This is out of the way, but does look slightly less intimidating on the Nexrad. The 108 knots of headwind make for a long, anxiety-filled leg before we turn east to penetrate the weather. It doesn’t look too bad on the ship’s radar, and it is surprisingly light-looking out the window. We dive right in. I make minor deviations around cells seen on radar. We accumulate ice on the windshield wipers, making anti-ice and deice necessary. This slows the airplane down, but at least we’re no longer throttled by headwinds. In 30 minutes, we shoot out the other side.

It seems like this flight pretty much mirrored all I had hoped to accomplish this winter. Our groundspeed, though we traveled west to east, never topped our true airspeed — no help at all from tailwinds. On the other hand, we got it done. The airplane performed well.

A visit to an ophthalmologist in Miami, well regarded for his surgical skill, got me a reprieve: no operation, he said. I got my AME designation from the regional flight surgeon, and my visit to my favorite AME was encouraging. He exhibited no signs of resentment that I might compete with him for business; in fact, he offered to help. And I passed the physical. So I am designated, my sight is stable and I am fit to fly. As for the sale of the airplane, well, we’ll see.

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