Reflecting on the solo

After a good cry, a good nap, good wine, a good night's sleep, and some cookie-baking, here's how I'm feeling about that solo:

Irritated. I'm irritated that the day I did my solo was a day that stretched my abilities. I'm irritated that it involved situations for which I wasn't prepared. I'm irritated that what I do know how to do was lost among what I couldn't do yet.

Still terrified. All day yesterday when I would think about how I felt each time it was time to turn final, the overwhelming anxiety and terror -- no melodrama, seriously -- would come back vividly and I would break down into tears all over again. Reliving the last two minutes of each pattern was torture. It's not as bad today, but gee whiz: I was damn lucky yesterday on all three landings. I reread the previous post about the solo several times, and it sounds so mundane, so blase, but it is the scariest thing I've ever been through.

Regret. I can't change what happened yesterday. My memory of my first solo will always be negative. It's not an experience I can share with people to encourage them to take up flying or happily share with other pilots when reminiscing.

Accomplished. This is kinda strange, but I came out of the solo ok. The plane is ok. The ways that I reacted to the situations allowed at least that much, so my training so far must have instilled some unanticipated-challenge-management tools (beyond by-the-book emergency procedures).

Surprised. In all seriousness, I cannot express how scared I was yesterday. Husband had a hand-held radio receiver while he was videotaping, and I can hear my transmissions on the video. I sound very calm and deliberate, not shaky and wacked out. And despite the fear and gut-wrenching agitation I was feeling, I kept it all together and took care of business. They always say that pilots are the coolest, calmest people in the world, even in the most dire of situations... Not that my situation was dire by most standards, but I am surprised by the cool and calm that governed what happened!

Resignation. This goes along with regret. What happened, happened, and can't be changed. So be it.

Acceptance. What happened, happened. So be it! I learned from first-hand experience. I learned because I had to figure it out in the moment. It wasn't a great solo, but it was my solo and I am now signed off to fly by myself (with range and condition limitations, of course).

I would like to say now that I'm ready to go up again, or that I'm looking forward to continuing the process. I'm not. I'm really dreading the next lesson (scheduled for tomorrow afternoon). Will it be a repeat? Will I hesitate? Will that anxiety come back, even in "easy" situations? Will Chuck treat me with kid gloves? (That's not what I want.) I looked at the completely still autumn leaves on the trees today and thought, "Hmmm, I could go up by myself right now if I wanted to." And it was a tempting thought, to just go out to the airport and do a few patterns alone, regain some confidence. But I didn't. I couldn't. What if it turned gusty again?

Flying is a risk. We learn, we train, we plan, we maintain our planes, we have ways of minimizing a lot of the risk. But it is and will always be a risk. I'm on a knife-edge right now on whether the risk is worth it. Husband is a great pilot, a calm and logical pilot who can handle crosswinds that are within his personal limits. That's encouraging. Then there's the pupil-dilating possibility of being in over your head and wondering what in the hell you could do to improve the situation without injury, death and damage (a.k.a., my solo). That's discouraging. I imagine that when it comes down to it, it's not the routine situations that dictate success as a pilot.

I was freaking lucky yesterday. Luck is not enough. Luck is not a stable foundation. Without the honed, ingrained experience, knowledge and understanding, there's just no point in taking it on. Call it muscle memory, call it reaction grown by repitition, call it training: yesterday taught me that I don't have enough of it. And now my luck bucket is empty. My experience bucket has barely a half-inch in it. My knowledge bucket doesn't have much more. From what am I supposed to draw in times of need?!?

We'll see how it goes tomorrow, supervised.