Richard Bach pens another soaring adventure tale

It first happened around 1970 or so. I was 18 and impressionable and into my life walked (or was it flew?) the words of a man on the wings of a bird. Not a cardinal, the bird of my home state, or a robin, so common in those parts, or even a mallard, which flies overhead each spring and fall. 

The bird that flew into my life and the man, whose carefully crafted sentences were to touch it again and again for 40 years and still counting, were Jonathan Livingston Seagull and his creator Richard Bach. 

Since that day—specific date on the calendar left unremembered back in those days of tie-died t-shirts and bellbottom blue jeans—Bach has flown into my life again and again, each time bringing me new characters to love, new words to entertain, new thoughts to inspire. 

Just when I needed them they found me—his books and his characters. Donald Shimoda in “Illusions,” little Dickie in “Running from Safety,” Budgeron Ferret in “Writer Ferrets: Chasing the Muse,” and more. 

About this time last year, Bach, whose path had crossed mine in real life (IRL, in cyber terms) while he was on Twitter for a short time a couple years ago, embarked on an adventure. As he did, he chronicled it on a website, now inactive. 

The adventure was a cross-country flight with a new love, a character not unlike Jonathan Livingston Seagull. 

This love of Bach’s life had wings like Jonathan, could touch down on the water like the illustrious gull, and had the ability to inspire, just like that prodigy-turned-mentor in Bach’s first bestseller. Her name is Puff. She can swim. She can fly. 

Mortals would call her an amphibious airplane, a SeaRey. Bach would call her a spirit, for that she is. 

Those posts Richard Bach first shared with a family of readers in cyberspace are now available in the pages of a book, one I held in my hands this week, so hot off the press that I can smell the inks used to bring it to life. 

In “Travels with Puff: A Gentle Game of Life and Death,” the author pours onto the pages a love story, an adventure chronicle, an inspirational work sure to warm the hearts of his most avid family of readers and strong enough to draw into that family a new band of members. 

In the early pages, we see a dance of courtship, reminiscent of some ritual of nature’s precious creatures, as Richard and Puff take steps, cautious at first, elegant before long, falling one for the other, earning trust, growing in love. 

Bach’s adventures with Puff begin near the lakes of Florida, Puff’s birthplace and first home, but the author’s dream is to get her to his hangar in the San Juan Islands of Washington State. 

As the pair court, the author and long-time pilot begins to prepare for the journey. He and Puff cavort in the Sunshine State’s skies and splash in its inland waters. Richard does all the practical things seasoned aviators must do before embarking on an adventure across the land, purchasing essential items and getting Puff all gussied up for her big dance. 

Richard Bach, the storyteller, has always been a master at word pictures. Because of this, he could have told Puff’s tale in words alone and it would have been a magnificent work. But, just as Russell Munson’s images of flight brought Jonathan to life in the pages of his book, another wayfarer's lens shows us Puff in all her  sojourner’s finery. 

A fellow aviator, Dan Nickens, a man with a passion not only for flight and for adventure, but also for geology, joins Bach on the journey, capturing in photos what Bach paints in words. The marriage of words and images makes the magnificent even more glorious. 

Nickens’ own  SeaRey, Jennifer, becomes a comfortable friend for Puff on the cross-country double date, and as the photographer sees the country and life through Bach’s eyes, Bach discovers wonders of the earth’s surface visible only through the lens of someone with Nickens’ loves. 

In “Travels with Puff,” the seasoned reader of Bach's work will see reminders of his earlier stories—a bit of Jonathan Livingston Seagull, glimpses of the iconic feather from “Illusions,” reminders of his Ferret Chronicles, images first shared by little Dickie in “Running from Safety,”  and more. 

In this work, Bach also weaves morsels that pay tribute to books that drew him in years ago and warm his heart still today—Kenneth Grahame’s “Wind in the Willows,” L. Frank Baum’s Oz books, the work of Mark Twain. It’s a nice touch.

Nothing on the dust jacket says, "Only read this if an experienced lover of Bach's books," just as nothing warns, "Beware, at the end of this book, you'll be in love, too—with the words on these pages and the freedom of flight." The first warning is unnecessary, as this book is sure to draw new readers. The second warning, I am certain, holds true.

Richard Bach hasn't lost the ability he has to pull us in on the very first page, take us flying toward his dreams and our own, and inspire us to find our passion and pursue it with the same child heart he shows us each time he puts words on paper.

As did Jonathan and Puff, with his latest book, Richard Bach does soar. And, as he did with each of his earlier books, Bach still draws me in, entertains me, and inspires me. 

“Travels with Puff” is published by Nice Tiger and available through major online booksellers. 

© Ann Tracy Mueller 2013

(Image via)

Head in the clouds

For years, the people who know me know this: I have my head in the clouds. 

Dreamer, I am. 

It keeps me a bit sometimes from fitting in well in their “real” world, but it’s the world where I can imagine what might be, dream, and see some of them come true. 

This is the tale of two pilots, a whole bunch of biplanes, the woman they inspired, and a magical ride over the Prairie State. 

It’s also about a couple more pilots who made a dream come true.

I remember as a little girl, standing next to our Western Illinois farm house and watching an airplane fly slow and low near our home. 

Much later, I learned that during my childhood and well into my teen years, my favorite author, Richard Bach, flew a biplane over many a small town, landed in numerous hayfields across the Midwest. 

As I read his books and learned of his barnstorming days, I always wondered what it would have been like, small impressionable kid, to have had the opportunity to have a plane drop in my field, to see a sign, reading “10-minute ride, $3,” to look down in wide-eyed wonder on the home where I lived – to ride with Richard Bach or another pilot like him.

Growing up, there was another pilot in my life – a World War II vet, home from the war, back on the farm, raising a bunch of kids, aviator wings packed away. His youngsters, among them a freckle-faced girl, knew their dad had flown airplanes, somewhere, sometime a long time ago. 

As time went on and biplanes from that war, Stearman aircraft, began to congregate just a mile from the girl-grown-woman’s home, she learned the open-cockpit wonders were the same planes in which her dad had learned to fly. 

The woman drove for more than 20 years past the Galesburg airport on her way to work each day; she remembered the photo on her grandparents’ wall of that young aviator; she read again and again Richard Bach’s books of aviation and inspiration. 

As time went by, she wondered what it would be like to fly, wind in her face in one of those planes. A little more time passed and she felt a pull, a “gotta-do-this” feeling. Eventually, it became a “can’t-not-do-it” need. 

I am that girl turned woman. 

Last year, I planned to spend a day at Galesburg’s Stearman Fly-in. I sent a couple emails, made phone call or two, and tried to arrange a flight. It wasn’t to be. 

Then, fly-in done, through the wonder called social media, my path crossed that of a Stearman pilot. One thing led to another, and I had an invite to “Come out to the airport next year and I’ll take you up.” 

That year couldn’t fly by fast enough. 

Back to Bach for a minute – he wrote of barnstorming near the Monmouth, Illinois airport in at least one of his books, of taking a young girl and her grandfather over the farm, of the farmer’s wife waving at the duo. 

Bach also wrote in his book “Illusions” of an advanced soul, Donald Shimoda, barnstorming with him – imaginary, perhaps to others, but more real to Bach than most of the flesh-and-blood people he’d encountered in his life.

Over the past few days, as I got more and more excited about my flight, I could tell my dad was itching to fly as badly as I was. When I met my pilot friend at the airport, I told him, “My dad trained in these,” and asked, “Know anyone who would take him up?”

Of course he did!

So yesterday, wind in our faces, wings on his chest, Dad and I flew in formation over a home where I once stood and watched Stearman overhead, to the Monmouth airport where I could imagine Richard and Shimoda flying with passengers – a girl and a man, both with child-hearts and a love of antique biplanes.

The excitement upon taking off, wind in my face, gentle turns and sharper banks, and feeling of tranquility in the air were all I’d hoped they’d be and more. 

And, the feeling of camaraderie with fellow flyers – one who stood beside me when I was a child, pointing up, as excited as I was, saying, “Look, it’s a plane!” – was beyond description. 

It was just as I’d imagined, growing up reading Bach’s books and feeling pride in my heart for my Dad’s service and piloting skills. And better than I’d dreamed, finding two modern-day barnstormer-types so willing to help my dad and me create this special memory.

I did wonder for a minute, though, as we were landing, if we were as characters in one of Bach’s books, Richard and Shimoda flying, a “girl” and a man as passengers, while a woman stood in the tent on the ground, big smile on her face, waving. 

My mom’s ready to fly! 

I’ll be back, Stearman.

© Ann Tracy Mueller 2012   

(Image via)

Rain on my parade

Like a small child on the night before Christmas, I climbed into the guest bed at my parents’ home the other evening, tossed and turned, head on the pillow, unable to fall asleep.

The light I turned back on, and button I pushed atop my cellphone to check my email and Facebook, read an article or two online. I did this again and again until the calendar on my phone’s clock was about to turn to the next day. 

Sleep came, finally, not fitfully, but bringing needed rest. But then as day turned to night, or night to day, at some hour unknown in the middle of it all, I heard it, outside my window – the sound of a waterfall rolling down the side of the house, constant, not ceasing. 

I closed my eyes, wishing it away. 

No, not this, I thought. Please rain, don’t dampen my parade. 

This was the morning I was, in my sixth decade of life, to take the ride in an antique biplane for which I’d waited since what seemed like forever.

The tossing and turning started anew, the rain continued. Sounds of a house awakening began – my octogenarian World War II Stearman pilot dad up and about, my mother, too. 

And it was I who said before bed “I’ll be up early. I’ll try to be quiet. Don’t worry about me. I’ll grab coffee when I go to Mickey D’s for wi-fi."

But, that breakfast dose of wi-fi – it was to be an appetizer to a main course, a flight in a WWII-era biplane. 

Now, with that seemingly spoiled, the appetizer had lost its appeal as well. Getting up and getting moving didn’t seem to matter. It wasn’t unlike arising on Christmas morning to find a tree under which no presents wait. 

“Wait for my call,” he’d said, my pilot friend, when we talked the night before to plan the flight.

Wait, I did, excited still – wondering if I’d be a character in the story of the little plane that will – or will not – take a rain-gone-past sky adventure. 

That morning the winds came and went, the skies stayed dark. By mid-afternoon, working again, I heard the sounds of Stearman in the air. 

I got a message saying the plane in which I was to ride stood “resting” in a hangar, so I looked forward to yet another excited night, morn of eager anticipation and flight of a lifetime. 

For, no matter how many times one flies – whether this is my first or only biplane ride – the exhilaration and joy of that first ride is a once-in-forever experience. 

Flyer-I-wannabe, I can’t wait to live it. 

Writer-I-am, I can’t wait to put in in words. 

Please come back to read about it, and I’ll come back to tell it.

© Ann Tracy Mueller 2012   

(Image via)

Back in the ‘Burg for a bit

One night early this week, I arrived back in what I’ve long called my hometown. 

It feels good.

Born in Galesburg, Illinois, I spent the first fourteen years of my life living on farms in nearby communities, then moved to the ‘Burg for what stretched day-by-day into more than 30 years. 

These days, I make my home on the banks of a big lake in the middle of Missouri. My parents and many other family members still live in Galesburg. 

As I write this, I am sitting in a relative’s home, looking out on a tree-lined street, hearing the sounds of train whistles in the background. 

This morning as I pulled out of my parents’ drive  to go to a local grocery store for luncheon provisions – and caffeine and chocolate to cure my anticipated mid-afternoon slump – I ran into an old friend at the store, a frequent occurrence in the ‘Burg, but infrequent in my new community.  There I may stumble upon new friends, occasionally. Old, not so much. 

It felt right.

As I drove on the street named after my hometown’s native son, Carl Sandburg, two Stearman biplanes, in town for the community’s annual fly-in, crossed overhead. 

Boy, do I love that sight!

Then, turning down one of the major north-south residential thoroughfares, Broad Street, I saw a runner, a pair of women walking and talking, and a couple of bikers.  

Galesburg  is that kind of place. 

Its streets are a welcoming environment for exercise. It does the heart good and I’m not just talking the physical benefits.

From Broad, I turned off on one of the city’s few one-way streets (I still love that about Galesburg – that it doesn’t have many), and traveled it for a couple blocks until I reached the street where we had our first home. It –and the neighborhood – are different, but still the same. I’d still choose that street – maybe even that house – as a place to call home.

I also passed Ronald Reagan’s childhood school, just steps from the home where my parents and I lived when we moved to Galesburg, and smiled as I continued my travels and I saw that a neighborhood corner still held a barber shop. I smiled even more when I saw that the barber whose name is on the building these days is the granddaughter of the man who gave my husband the best cuts he ever had and has cut my dad’s hair for about four decades. 

As I sit here writing, I hear some of the same sounds I hear in my new community – a lawn mower, a dog barking, the purr of a Harley passing by – and there are sounds I don’t hear, such as a duck quacking, geese honking or a jetski flying too fast down the cove. 

I like those sounds, too, and that place, but it sure is nice once in a while to come back here, where my mother still turns down the covers before I go to sleep and my dad makes room in the garage for my car. 

There are lots of reasons I still love my hometown – and those two people rank right up there at the top of the list. 

It feels like home.

© Ann Tracy Mueller 2012   

(Image via)