And You Will Find Love

"Ten."

"Do you know what a 'roving eye' means?"

"My mother says it's a man who's 'unfaithful.'"

The priest began coughing. "I think you're learning too much too fast. But to answer your question, no. Just be careful, my daughter."

You too?

Barbara made the sign of the cross after receiving absolution for sins she wasn't sure she had committed. She even had made up a few venial sins, to make the trip to the confessional worthwhile.

During both grammar and high school, Barbara had no lasting friends because her mother moved them to a new apartment in a new neighborhood every year or two. Barbara grew up with the strongest memory of her girlhood sitting on the tailgate of a mover's truck, waving good-bye to her friends. In her new neighborhood, she would find it difficult to make new friends and would spend most of her after-school time in going to more movies or reading more books.

She wondered why they moved so often, and her mother said she was always looking for a better place for them to live. But to Barbara, all of the apartments and neighborhoods looked the same. It was not until years later that she learned the real reason they moved every year or two. It was because her mother could not pay even the small rent, and the landlord asked them to leave.

The next time Barbara was up in Gail's room, they talked about flying. Gail had already told her she learned to love flying from her father, so it was Barbara's turn.

She said she had always been excited by the sight of an airplane in the skies over Chicago, but nothing made her heart race more than the May day when she was nine. She read The Chicago Tribune headlines that a young Minnesota aviator, Charles A. Lindbergh, had flown his plane solo across the Atlantic Ocean from New York to Paris. Seeing photos of how tall and slim, dashing and handsome he was, she fell in love with him, as most girls in the world did.

Lindbergh made such an impression on her that in Barbara's dreams, Ivanhoe no longer swept her up onto his horse and rode off with her to his castle; Lindy invited her into his airplane and together they flew off into the bright skies.

"Do women fly airplanes, too?" she asked her mother.

"I've heard of a few. They must be crazy."

Flying didn't sound crazy to Barbara. It sounded wonderful.

After reading about "Lucky Lindy," Barbara investigated at the library and found newspaper articles about women fliers. She learned about Lillian Boyer who was a stunt flyer, and Laura Ingalls who set women's loop-the-loop records.