Heart In The Clouds

By Bob Liddil

In the darkness of my bedroom, by the light of a single bulb, at the age of nine I first opened a well-worn book called, "Aviation Stories For Boys." Slim Tyler was the young hero's name, an orphan who from the very first page longed to find the father he'd never known.

I knew how he felt. As I turned those pages one after the next toward the end of the first chapter, it became obvious to me that Slim and I had much in common. I loved airplanes at that time of my life before television or cars or girls dragged my attention away in a thousand directions. Like Slim, I hung around a tiny private airfield that was less than fifteen minutes away from my front yard as the bicycle rolls. And like Slim, I felt alone in a hostile world.

My grandfather knew of this passion. He paid 25 cents for that book and enjoyed very much the squeal of glee that burst from me when I first read the title. It was love at first sight.

Slim Tyler

Slim Tyler, adventurer extraordinaire, filled my dreams with treasure hunting by airplane. I flew to Greenland with him to rescue his mentor and discovered through his eyes that the villainous Nate Shaley had plotted to frame him for a crime he did not commit. Slim and I were partners in a way different than Buck Rogers or Tom Swift. Though both these others were fliers, Slim and I were brothers.

"Aviation Stories For Boys" took me four months to finish. By the time Nate Shaley had been soundly defeated for the last time and all conspiracies in this 800-page book were resolved, school was out and my birthday loomed. Though I eagerly looked forward to finding out what happened at the end, I was saddened by the loss of this beloved friend.

On my birthday, July 4, 1957, my grandfather, who had painstakingly saved the ten dollars needed, took me down to the airport near our house and bought my very first flying lesson. That day, I took to the air in a Piper Cub and joined the eagles. Slim Tyler and I were as one in the brotherhood of flight.

I grew older and as I did so, I periodically took lessons in gradually more and more modern planes. But like most boys who want to be a fireman, a policeman or a doctor, my dreams of flying were only that, for I had neither the talent nor the means to earn my wings for real.

A few years ago, I was in Maine on business and had to fly quickly back to Boston, cutting my trip short. I pulled a charter service out of the yellow pages to do the job and waited for him to arrive to pick me up.

Snow started to fall, slowly at first, then more and more, covering the airfield with a dusting of white that took my mind back to that boyhood book and the hero pilot who flew all the way to Greenland in a single engine monoplane. It was a pleasant journey through time that was interrupted by the sound of my ride, taxiing to a halt at my gate.

I saw before me, an older airplane, the model escapes me just now. It was bright yellow, in contrast all that white. The pilot got out to greet me and take my bag as came toward him in the snow. He was a tall, older man, muscular of build, gray haired with a thick handlebar moustache. He wore a leather bomber jacket covered with patches I vaguely recognized as military squadrons. He took my bag and briefcase and stowed them in the baggage bin behind the back seat, then unabashedly stuck out a friendly hand.

"I'm your Captain for the day," he said with a grin. "My name is Slim Tyler."

The look of utter amazement that crossed my face when he said that caught his attention and I offered a simple explanation by noting pleasantly, "I've flown with you before." I shook his hand so enthusiastically; he must have thought me a little crazy.

From Bangor to Boston, in a mild snowstorm, the little plane bounced and bucked exactly the way the rescue plane to Greenland had done in "Aviation Stories For Boys." My pilot, as had the Slim Tyler from the book handled the inconvenience of bad weather expertly, with an ease that revealed the natural flyer in him.

We arrived at Logan Airport seven minutes early by the schedule that had been set and I tipped my pilot 50 dollars, complimenting his skills and wishing him the very best of luck.

As a westbound 727, with me aboard, taxied past the flight line where the little yellow plane was being refueled, I gave that pilot one last invisible salute from my first class seat. A sense of peace and fulfillment came over me, a joy like few I have known. Once, more than 30 years ago I'd flown with Slim Tyler on impossible missions to faraway places and that day I had met him in person. He would always be in my mind, forever free to adventure, and even in routine flights, forever a hero.

My son turned nine yesterday. Amongst the Nintendo and his beloved Harry Potter books, he found a carefully wrapped, almost mint condition copy of "Aviation Stories For Boys." He was delighted and vowed to start it immediately.

That night, when I went in to turn off his light after he'd fallen asleep reading, I checked the page on which he'd stopped. I am happy to report that Slim Tyler and his archenemy Nate Shaley are alive and well.

Somewhere in Main, the former barnstorms still.