Flying Dreams

Do you ever have flying dreams?

I love flying dreams. It doesn't happen very often. Those were always my favorite dreams. Sometimes you were just flying for no reason. I mean, it's my dream, I'll do whatever the heck I like! When I was little, I can recall having a nightmare where I seemed to be stuck. It would happen all the time. The nightmare creature is coming, but you can't move, because your legs are heavy like lead. But every once in awhile, I would start running, and suddenly take off, just like a bird. The nightmare would turn into a dream.

Those are dreams. Even airplanes hold some of that magic. Steering those heavy machines may not be the same as being a bird, but it ain't too bad. Heck, give me a Corsair and a tank of fuel, and I'll be happy. But we all know we haven't really conquered flight yet. The birds still whoop our butts. For the past century, that's been okay. Man can't fly like birds; hang gliders are as close as we'll ever come.

Two years ago I was lying in bed listening to the final song on Eric Whitacre's choral album. I had not read the song title, and was not paying close attention to the lyrics. All I knew was that the music seemed to lift my imagination and bring back those childish dreams of flying. I began wondering what it would take to really fly like a bird. Sure, at one time it seemed impossible to mimic the complexities of nature and flight, but then at one time they said man would never fly at all. And what would it take to make artificial wings? We all know man isn't strong enough to "flap" or control anything that flew anything like a bird. But then technology is discovering extremely complex programming methods through LISP, artificial muscles, new materials incomparably light and strong - who is to say man can't make a pair of wings that can hold his body and fly just like a bird? It isn't like the bird-man could just hold a joystick. That isn't how a bird flies. The wings would have to read the man's body, to know exactly whether he was just craning his neck, or leaning forward to dive, or catching a thermal to soar up. It would require two miracles: the physical, artificial structure of wings that could hold a man and maintain stable flight, and an impossibly complex computer brain to control all the millions of computations and adjustments required to mimic bird-flight. Sure, it would be hard, taking years of research and millions of dollars (billions?), but who is to say it is impossible?

So, while lying in bed listening to "Leonardo dreams of his flying machine" [I had not read the song title], I dreamed of my own flying machine. Which means two things: Eric Whitacre is brilliant, and Icarus never learned his lesson. I considered leaving Bible college and studying physics, aerodynamics, ornithology, and artificial intelligence, but nothing really came of it. It was just a flying dream.