It will have been necessary for me not less of about ten readings to understand finally the sense of this history. Subtlety lies in the fact that protagonists take place aboard a single place glider aircraft. They are in fact the two facets of the same person : Richard Bach. The characters of the one and the other one are diametricaly different. The one that holds commands is a exalted poet , impatient to feel free again, going back to his favourite element : air. He is in a state of jubilation close to the bliss going as far even as comparing every takeoff with a new birth. He is in no way concentrated on his flight parameters and makes fun royally of the soaring competition in which he is supposed to participate. The other person (conjugated to the first person), is a killjoy procedurer, annoyed by the rigorous lack of a flight instructor, seeing in the landscape arround only potential dangers. Which is not the bewilderment when, after the takeoff, the poet releases himself too much early from the towing cable, making so very weak the chances to join the landing field. In this mountainous region, made by lakes, by forests and by cliffs, any forced landing would be extremely risky. Finding the providential lift becomes then a question of life or death. The poet laughs at it and counts on his chance, while the other one does not stand having only this solution. In spite of some minutes of fear, everything will end happily ...
This story reminds us that once in flight, we navigate all between these two attitudes, and that it is not always easy to reconcile admiring beauties of the sky and the total mastery of the machine...
Loops, voices and the fear of death
Richard evokes here difficult situations in which every pilot is brought to be confronted one day: taken in the trap of a weather which degrades faster than forecasted, involved in an autorotation of which it'is impossible to get out, sucked down by downward wind in mountain... The only question that one asks to himself at this moment there is always the same: " What am I doing here? ". The answer which gives Richard is nevertheless simple: " I am not somewhere else, I do live the present moment by fighting to protect my life. Only moments as those are to estimate the real price for it ". Going out from such situations give a victory feeling on elements and on ourselves.
The pleasure of their company
Richard speaks about writers who urged him to push the doors of the sky and supports the idea that it is not necessary to meet a writer so that he becomes friend. It is enough to read his books ! he takes for example Antoine de Saint Exupéry, who was already necessary to be able to perceive through the thick cloud of smoke of cigarette which surrounded constantly his head. Those that knew him confidentially, dreaded so much that he'd speak about his health that to wait for the return of one of his flights by wondering if he would think of taking out his landing gear. Richard Bach claims what is more there are all the chances so that the German pilot who has shot him down without suspecting, naturally which was his target, possessed at his home (bombed by the allied) all the Saint Ex's books