April 2 — Jetliners

I don’t often witness the magic of flight up close, but here at Gravelly Point Park I’m just in front of the runway at Reagan National. Seeing airplanes from afar doesn’t count, nor does taking a commercial flight, as you lose a sense of speed, sound, and distance. With the exception of occasional turbulence and a peephole window, you might as well be stepping into a teleportation chamber.

As I’m playing ultimate at the park, a jetliner flies right between me and the sun. Its wide shadow crosses the field at takeoff speed like a leviathan hurtling through the depths of the sea. That thing was huge — and moving fast. I’ve had the physics of flight explained to me, but that’s no substitute for the awareness that the human race has somehow found a way to send huge assemblages of metal hurtling through the sky. And thanks to the precision and consistency of modern aircraft we have the audacity to get into these contraptions without hesitation.

In the afternoon the wind turns off the river. Instead of taking off jetliners begin to land overhead. A few seconds after one passes above us the air starts crackling and popping like it’s full of static. We look up and see nothing — an invisible wake rippling across the atmosphere. It seems fitting to me in that moment that these aerial monsters do not traverse the jet streams without tearing apart the fabric of the sky.