Above the Earth

It's Halloween. I'm on my third flight to Zurich, Switzerland. What an expanse of beautiful land and water we've soared over! The fall blaze of orange, red, and chestnut leaves encircling the Duluth airport. That cantankerous Lake Superior, whose winds and moods you can guess from wave patterns below. Still reddish from the Nemadji River Basin muds brought down in weeks of rain.

We flew to Minneapolis and then east through the night, crossing six time zones. Now we're headed east again from Amsterdam. I'm hoping to see the Alps, even Mont Blanc, where I hiked two summers ago. It's partly cloudy. Yet I see snow-capped mountains out my window.

I love flying, even though I often think it's God-defying. Sometimes it feels precarious, especially if your vessel is battered by wind or storms. Once, over Alaska, returning from Japan with my 9-year-old son, we were struck by lightning. The huge plane shuddered and took a stomach-jolting dive. Several women in front of us were screaming. I held David's hand tightly and said, without any proof, "I've never heard of a plane going down from a lightning strike." Oh, the trust of a child!

So many adventures I've had on airplanes. This summer, on the way to meet up with my hiking pals in Birmingham, U.K., I sat next to an emergency room doctor on his way home. Just after we took off, all three flight attendants arrived at my seat in their natty blue outfits and said, "it's your birthday!" "WHAT?? Oh, it's tomorrow. Oh, it's already tomorrow! Yes, it is!" They handed me a card, a small bottle of champagne, and a generous chunk of cake. I offered my seatmate some champagne - "I don't drink alcohol," he demurred, "but I'd be happy to share some cake!"

How does a doctor from Kashmir find emergency room work? "I like it a lot," he said. "I work intensively with each person for only a few hours." He also explained the ongoing struggles of Kashmir, his home country, with its belligerent neighbor, India.

At this moment, I can see both the Eiger and Grindelwald and its surrounding peaks, where I've hiked and skied in years past. And Mont Blanc rising up from its massif. Fun to see them covered with snow. Alas, my cell phone won't take a photo!

I've enjoyed many conversations on airplanes. Most I can't remember. Most are with men traveling on business. A couple of weeks ago, returning from Liverpool, with a Bavarian man whose firm provides software for northern Minnesota and North Dakota machining companies. His accounts of his work entertained me for those tedious hours when you are strapped in and wishing you could be horizontal.

When I got together with my husband-to-be Rod, he had never flown on an airplane. He'd been all over the USA on motorcycles with his wife Barb, my best friend, who'd died the winter before. I had an invitation to go teach with a South African colleague in Cape Town. South Africa had just emerged from apartheid. Their new leaders wanted to cut their defense budget and convert workers, technologies, plants and bases to peacetime uses. I invited Rod to join me. He was an amazing "senior" first-time flyer at age 62. We left from San Francisco, where I was working that fall, and flew to the Canary Islands, where the plane had to refuel. I remember how thrilled he was. And, unlike me, able to sleep sitting up. And, he let me lay my head and shoulders on his lap!

Most of my flights have been to teach, research or participate in conferences. Over the years, I made wonderful friends, especially in Japan, South Korea and Brazil, where I lectured and wrote, hiked on weekends and explored cultural events after hours. Someday I won't be globe trotting anymore, and that will be okay. I'll miss seeing them, but there's always Skype and the internet.

For now, when the plane lifts off the ground and climbs at a steep angle, I still feel a small frisson of delight. It's sunny up here. Below us are billowing clouds in layers as if someone were folding fabric. The sun illuminates the puffy rises as if they were lit from within. It's what Rod calls eye candy. And Greenland! Wow - so shapely, with glacial ridges plunging right down to the sea, and small chunks calving off and floating who knows where. I'm above the earth, and I'm resolving to do everything I can to keep it as beautiful as it is.

Economist Ann Markusen is an emerita professor from the University of Minnesota and lives in Red Clover Township, Carlton County.