A quiet milestone in a noisy journey—finally doing the thing I wasn’t sure I could.

Most of my flying experience has been at large, paved airports—and after a 9+ year break from flying, the idea of returning to a small grass strip brought a lot of anxiety with it. Add in the challenge of learning to fly a tailwheel aircraft for the first time, and this milestone felt a long way off.

It’s taken time to rebuild my confidence and get comfortable in the airplane again, especially in this new environment. But little by little, with each flight, I chipped away at the fear—and today, I finally made it back. This might not look like much from the outside, but for me, it was a huge step.

The article that I mentioned in the video: “The (Un)Natural” by John Bishop, Plane and Pilot Magazine: https://planeandpilotmag.com/unnatural/