By Robbie Culver
Ballet, airplanes, grace, discipline.
For Mary Elizabeth Kurek, EAA 1333410 and current Ray Aviation scholar for EAA Chapter 461 in Bolingbrook, Illinois, these ideas fit well together. Ballet and airplanes. Her friends and extended family know her as “M.E.,” and I know her as a young lady I have been mentoring as she learns to fly, trying to inspire the future of aviation. She is more family than friend, and a personal inspiration to me with her strength, grace, discipline, and dignity.
Her mother Amy Reeb, EAA 1333411, asked me to take some photos of M.E. on Thursday, July 25, out on the flightline. Of course I said yes. Oh — and the photos? M.E. was in full ballet mode. Now, you may think dance and flying aircraft do not mix; I would say they do. Both involve grace, and both involve discipline.
Grace — the elegance and form of the movement, each one executed to perfection. Discipline — the mental strength and focus required to go back and do it over, and over, and over again until the muscle memory matches the ideal. Sounds like pattern work. Doing so in a studio or on stage is one thing, but doing it in the grass at AirVenture, slick with morning dew, that’s something else altogether.
Seven a.m. comes early at Oshkosh, but we were out in the morning sunshine, shooting as planned by the homebuilts. For all the planned poses and well-considered angles, it was the unexpected opportunity that made for the best images.
We took some in front of my Sonex, and then as I was putting the canopy cover back on, a line of T-28s pulled up on the taxiway at an angle and began their morning run-up. The roar and snarl were the perfect symphony of AirVenture in the morning, and the props left vapor trails in the still morning air. Amy had M.E. run over and start dancing across the edge of the homebuilt parking area in front of the T-28s.
I dropped what I was doing and sprinted over to capture the moment. Mary Elizabeth posed and danced and smiled and posed again. I could only imagine what the pilots were thinking, other than, “Please don’t go past the edge of the showline!” We didn’t.
Amy and Mary Elizabeth had arranged ahead of time to do some poses in front of “The Pink Jet” (ThePinkJet.org), and pilot Stephanie Goetz even let her up in the cockpit. In Saturday’s issue of AirVenture Today, EAA Publications Intern Angela Satterlee wrote this about the aircraft: “‘The Pink Jet’ is not just a pretty airplane; it is also a symbol for every woman struggling with breast cancer. Steve Oakley, EAA 1417153, is the founder of Aerial Angels out of Burbank, California, with his wife, Jamie Oakley, EAA 1417154.” They own the pink L-39 Albatros and brought it to Oshkosh for its world debut.
Stephanie gave M.E. a big hug after the photos were taken.
Inspiring the future of aviation — with grace and discipline.