Starting Over

5,500 feet was a good altitude for the little Cessna. The scrubby Texas land sprawled out to the south for the passenger on the right side of the plane. The Gulf of Mexico was out there just over the horizon.

For pilot Mickey Deezley, or Dizzy, the day was moving along smartly. Still 26 minutes from touchdown Dizzy started looking over his checklists and figuring out if he wanted to follow the Rio Bravo up to Laredo or just fly the most direct heading. Most passengers liked seeing the river snake along and taking in the horses drinking on the bank or the sheep grazing on the hills. There were few clouds below so he decided on the river.

Just then, something caught Dizzy's eye and damn if it wasn't a Mexican eagle. Just like on the Mexican flag. A northern crested caracara was doing lazy circles at about 5,600 feet and Dizzy had a perfect view. He felt like he and the eagle made eye contact. That was worth the 4 am wake up. Well, any day flying was worth a 4 am wake up.

Dizzy reached over for his logbook stuck between his seat and the empty co-pilot sea.

That's when he saw the envelope. And the money.

It wasn't his official logbook with the duration of flight, whether it was day or night, visual or instrument flight rules, and the number of hours logged... No, this was Dizzy's personal little black leather flying book. The book with all the good stuff in it. He'd sit in the cockpit after a flight, muse on what he learned, and write it all down in that leather black book.

The book had notes on passengers, quite a few in fact on a fifth grade English teacher who flew between Monterrey and San Antonio once a month. Also, cloud formations, tricky winds in the mountains, and which students needed help with steep turns and which were having trouble with stall and spin recovery. He had lots of entries on wildlife like hawks and now today's eagle and other critters he spotted from the air. He'd seen whales in the Gulf, coyotes on land, and fellow flyers in the air. All the notable things on every flights since... well, since he crashed.

Dizzy had been a crop duster and at age 20 as he was moving up in the aviation world he did crash a plane and survived without a scratch. The plane was totaled. The FAA interviewed him, drug tested him, and grounded him for a while but they determined it was pilot error plain and simple. He fell asleep. Since then, Dizzy'd flown thousands of hours on the Texas border without mishap. He tells every passenger and every student pilot about the crash and some do walk away saying, 'no thanks.' That goes in the book too.

Truth is most pilots in Texas consider Dizzy the best small engine pilot in the country. But, thanks to the crash he'd never fly the big commercial jets for the airlines. He'd fly little bug catchers for cattlemen, tourists, a pretty fifth grade teacher and student pilots in Texas. Today's passengers heard the news about the crash and smiled. That struck Dizzy as odd.

Before he could pull the book up to his lap to make a quick entry on the eagle, he had noticed the white envelope wedged in the middle of the book. And in the envelope was a large amount of cash. A large, large amount of cash.

Dizzy had a another look at his passengers. Two men, mid-thirties. They had called last minute saying they were looking at horses at Mexican ranches and needed to fly back to Laredo because the plane they chartered was out of service. No problemo.

OK. Now, obviously, drug money. Pretty much your standard narco deal on the border. Plata (money) or Plomo (lead). Take the drug money and you just signed a contract that says you fly for us. Don't take it and take a bullet. From the looks of those two, they wouldn't care much one way or the other. Dizzy figured it could be the Gulf cartel or the Zetas, he was never sure who was winning the battle for control of the border. Either way, they'd be deadly.

Twenty two minutes to touchdown. Dizzy began his checklist.

First, fly the airplane. That's always first. The plane was trimmed nicely, Dizzy didn't really have to touch it and it would stay within a degree of his course and 100 feet of his altitude.

He could radio Laredo tower and say, "Cessna November Mike 3304 I have two drug runners on board and would like for you to contact the proper authorities." The narcos were smart to plant the money on him. After all, there's a $15,000 limit for cash being brought in from Mexico and if the Department of Homeland Security did a check, which was doubtful, the money would be on Dizzy, not the bad guys. Of course, presumably they carried their own contraband. Meth? Who knows?

Dizzy thought 'they can't shoot me on the plane since they need a pilot. But if I take the money the narcos will think I'm on the take and fair game to run drugs, money and guns whenever they want. Dizzy was not interested in that at all. If he just said, 'hey thanks, guys, but I'm good.' Then he would be suspect and would be able to identify them and turn them in later. They just might need to kill him in the parking lot.

After all, the bar for killing people was very low on the border. Dizzy had been on many search missions from the air along the border. Most of the time they ended in recovery missions with Dizzy spotting the body or bodies and Homeland Security picking them up. How many of them were involved in the drug trade Dizzy didn't know.

Dizzy went further down the checklist. He could "squawk" 7700 for an emergency. Or, 7500 for a hostage situation. That just involved turning a button on his transponder alerting Laredo tower. He might be able to talk around the problem with the tower and they could figure it out.

Eighteen minutes to touchdown. Dizzy had to decide.

"Cessna November Mike 3304, Laredo Tower, state your intentions."

"Laredo Tower, Cessna November Mike 3304. I'll fly visual flight rules up the river for runway 27, estimated 15 minutes from now. Over."

One of the men shifted and Dizzy could see the worn leather holster and butt of a Colt sticking out from under his denim jacket. Not unusual to see in Texas, but not welcome on his plane.

Twelve minutes to go.

"Cessna 04 can we have a Pirep?"

Pilot report. Sure. "Pretty bumpy here at 5500. Has been since Monterrey, partly cloudy the whole way too, ceiling at about 7,000 feet. Tower, I'm going to climb to 10,000."

"Roger, tower out."

Nine minutes.

Dizzy pressed the throttle all the way in and pitched the nose of his plane up. The plane gained altitude. 6,000 feet, 6,500, 7,000. Meanwhile, Dizzy pulled the red mixture throttle back, leaning the mixture so there was more oxygen going to the engine and less fuel.

"You know, gentlemen, this is my last flight," Dizzy said. "And to celebrate," he paused to look at his unofficial log book, "I'm throwing away my logbook!" Dizzy opened the window, he grabbed the leather book, making sure to pinch it tight so the envelope wouldn't slip out, and let it go.

From 9,000 feet the leather book spun towards the ground and the envelope tipped out as hundred dollar bills floated in the air headed for the cactus and mesquite below.

Dizzy started a steep descent.

The younger man in the back reached for his gun, unsure what to do, but knowing he did not like seeing his bosses $20,000 go out the window.

"What the hell...!"

Then, the engine sputtered.

Dizzy had not enriched the fuel mixture on descent so as the plane lost altitude the engine was slowly starved of fuel. Too much oxygen, not enough fuel.

"Damn!" Dizzy said. "Gentlemen, make sure your belts are on tight!"

Dizzy tipped the plane's nose over using just the slightest pressure on the yoke and let the left rudder put the plane in a spin. Seeing the Earth revolve from 6,000 feet and coming up fast is often an upsetting experience for the uninitiated. Both of the men in the back were turning green, saying prayers, and doing their best, but not succeeding, at keeping all their bodily fluids in their bodies.

With less than a thousand feet to go, Dizzy applied right rudder, tipped the nose further to break the stall, and glided to level flight. He enriched the mixture and engaged the engine. The runway was in sight, he entered the traffic pattern, and touched down smooth as could be.

ONE MONTH LATER

Dizzy wasn't taking new passengers. And apparently the two men and their bosses didn't want to engage Dizzy's services any further. What with the crash and all. They didn't go into detail about the flight on their return to the cartel base. They just said the pilot was crazy. Even drug traffickers have standards.

His passenger today was the fifth grade teacher, on her way back to teach English in Monterrey from her home in San Antonio. She had her daughter on board. By now, she knew Dizzy pretty well.

"You know," she said, "you're a pretty good pilot when you're awake."

Dizzy pretended to nod off and woke up with a start. "What? Where are we!?" Both passengers in the back laughed.

I'm a pretty good dancer awake too," Dizzy said. "Would you be interested in a little Texas two step next time you are in San Antonio?"

"Yes." The little girl looked at her mom as if she had just won a bet and the mom smiled.

Back on the ground, Dizzy saw off his passengers and went back to the cockpit to write to his "unofficial report" in his new logbook. It was a nice leather one. Even after a three hour hike in the desert he never did find the first one.

The first entry in the new book read: "Starting over. Again."

Further down the page it had the teacher's name and telephone number and a reminder. "Learn the Texas two step."