The day I'd been dreading

The day I’d been dreading for months finally arrived. When my flying-obsessed husband bought a tiny scarlet bi-plane a couple of years ago I knew it wouldn’t be long before my teenage children were clamouring to go up.

Actually, I managed to put off the dreadful prospect for ages, arguing that they weren’t old enough and my husband needed more practice at the controls.

“But I’ve got hundreds of hours of flying experience,” he protested.

“Yes, but surely you need a bit more training in this plane?” I said, and amazingly he agreed.

With the weather so dismal and grey this summer, I hoped I might have managed to put everyone off till next year. But yesterday dawned annoyingly bright and fair – one of those summer days when the sky is blue and there’s not a breath of wind. Sure enough, my husband brewed me a strong coffee to calm my nerves, my daughter turned on the mega-watt charm and they both got to work persuading me.

So I caved in. I made my husband promise to give her a safety talk worthy of British Airways, fasten up Lottie’s straps so tight that she couldn’t move and “not,” I repeated, “not” to do any scary loop the loop stunts.

I hardly saw them for dust as they both raced out of the door, clearly terrified I might change my mind. An hour later there was a familiar roar overhead and running outside, I could see a little red plane streaking across the cloudless sky.

When they finally arrived back, my daughter was beaming. “Were you scared,” I asked. “No,” she replied with a hint of pride in her voice. “Not even when he did an emergency landing at Leicester.”

My heart nearly stopped. “Emergency landing?” I asked. “What was all that about?”

“Oh nothing,” she said airily. “It was only because he needed the loo.”