Quite unexpectedly, I received an email from Tim, the flight instructor who supervised me on a lesson while I was in Ohio. He wrote “It was a pleasure to fly with you last weekend. You did a great job and will be an excellent pilot.”

This was a very welcome bit of encouragement.

On a related note, my nephew, Ben, is exploring joining the National Guard to become a Blackhawk helicopter pilot. He has virtually zero exposure to the world of aviation, and I was hoping to let him backseat on my lesson last Saturday. Alas, the Cessna 150 has no back seat, so that was out.

So I did the next best thing.

Before I left Ohio, I bought him an hour of flight time with Dave, the guy who owns the operation out there. Ben can go at his convenience and have an hour’s worth of fun and/or terror behind the controls. I want to give him the aviation encouragement that I didn’t get as a kid, and that he’s unlikely to get from his dad. So I went over and let Dave swipe my credit card for $85 for an hour for the aircraft rental. (Fuel included.)

Here’s something which really surprised and impressed me. Dave’s not charging for his time as pilot to take Ben up, as he wants to encourage any young prospective aviator to participate in general aviation. That’s just amazing that anyone in this day and age would do anything for free like that.

Free. Kinda like encouragement.

Encouragement’s free. But its worth is far greater than can be measured in currency.