DIANE MAKAR MURPHY Flying lesson was a real eye-opener for first-timer

I wake up thinking, "Be a Pilot." Be a pilot?! What? Am I out of my mind?! In two hours, I'll be at the controls of a little two-seater airplane, taking my life in my hands above the Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport in Vienna, with little more than a half-hour of training.
It's a promotion to get people interested in becoming pilots -- $49 for an introductory flying lesson. But more to the point, it's something new that I've never done. And what's more, with the Wright Brothers centennial of flight next month, it's a great story.
I meet Mike Hillman, a flight instructor with AM Air Flight Centre, which is participating in the promotion. It is near the Youngstown-Warren airport. Hillman gives me a tour of the classrooms, map room and flight simulator. He shows me the planes the flight school and its sister business, Alpha Aircraft Charter use. Then, he points out the Cessna 152 I'll be flying.
A preflight check takes us in a circle around the plane, then we climb in -- the Enthusiast and the Reluctant One. Hillman adjusts his seat with a click, fastens his seat belts rapidly and reaches for another checklist.
I fumble with my lap belt, then my shoulder strap. Next, I move my seat forward and squeeze my body into the tightened safety belts. Duh. A little farther forward and my feet finally reach the rudder pedals. I'm in the pilot's seat, and, just like a driver's education instructor, Hillman sits behind a duplicate wheel and set of pedals.
He teaches me how to taxi to the runway, then directs, "Put your hands on the control wheel." He grabs his duplicate controls; we accelerate, pull back on our respective wheels and ascend.
Love of flight
The first time Hillman did this, he was 14. His father was a private pilot, and Hillman got his private pilot's license at 17. He took his first solo flight on his 16th birthday, the first day he was allowed to. I had asked him, "What made you want to fly?"
"Just wait until you get up there," he said. "I've never taken a person up who didn't think it was incredible."
I hold the armrests like I'm in a dentist's office. It's a windy day, and the jostling, which on the ground would have barely disturbed me, has my stomach dropping like I'm on the Blue Streak.
Hillman's hand taps my thigh. "You know, a lot of people think if you turn off the engine, you crash. But you don't in a small plane. You just glide. In fact, in an actual lesson, I push in the throttle. That way, a student doesn't have a fear of crashing. As long as there is a place to land, you're OK."
As he looks out the window, I see sunlight on his calm face. Below us is an autumnal panorama of yellow, red and brown. It looks like the landscaping of a model train set.
"A week ago, it was even more beautiful," he says.
Not enjoying it
I don't want to look at it, so I just feign a glance. My left hand still clutches the armrest on the door, until I notice my fingers are wrapped around the door latch. I jerk it away.
"Do you want to take the controls?" Hillman says.
"No!" There is no hesitation. It had been the point; the Be a Pilot promotion offered the chance to fly a plane on your first lesson. I don't care. I don't want to.
Before we got into the Cessna, I asked Mike if he preferred flying himself, as opposed to using an airline. "Myself," he had answered.
The sun streams into the cockpit as Hillman banks over my house in Boardman, then toward the university and on to Vienna. "I can fly to Florida in two hours," he says.
My armpits are sweating.
Not a moment of the incredible vista do I enjoy. Like a kid on the Tilt-o-Whirl, I want the ride to end. I want to scream and make faces and throw my arms up and toss my breakfast. But I am an adult woman, floating above a gorgeous landscape, being jostled lightly like a kite in the wind.
We land with Hillman's deft hand at the wheel, touching down lightly, and it is over.
I will go down as the first and perhaps only person Hillman has taken up who did not like it. He is surprised. "On a less windy day?" he suggests.
murphy@vindy.com
XTo find out more about the "Be a Pilot" program, call (888) Be A Pilot or register online at www.beapilot.com.