His Choice

Can't get it out of my head. I see it when I close my eyes to try and sleep. I see it when I look at a blue sky. I see it when people are talking to me. I don't hear them.

It's only been 10 days and I've replayed it a thousand times.

Down he went, beyond a distant tree line. He would come back up. Yes! Yes, he would come back up. He's okay. He is. He's okay.

Then the smoke.

I shouted. No. Screamed. No. No. No. No. No. I sank to my knees. Cried. Bawled like a baby

The others didn't see it. Their back was turned to it. They wondered why I cried.

I cried for the best friend I had ever had. A friend I knew better than anyone knew him outside his family. I cried for the man who I shared that wonderful machine with. The machine he loved. Said it had changed his life. Said he had never dreamed he would do what the machine had let him do. He made his choice and knew the risks. Accepted them.

I hardly knew him when we decided to buy it. Violated every rule in the book. No agreement. No contract. No nothing but a hand shake. 

And for fourteen years we worked on it, tinkered with it, fixed it, improved it, caressed it, displayed it to thousands, flew it with untold relish.

And all those years, never a cross word passed between us. Not a single argument.

My friend. My friend.

George “Bud” Myers.

I chose the skies

That few have known

To follow where

The winds have blown.

To battle storms

That none have seen

To find seas of gold

And lands still green.

And if some day

I don't return

Don't cry for me

Don't be concerned

For high above

The clouds will sing

For a world I loved

And silent wings.

The Choice

by Geoffrey H. Tyler