Houston, we have lift off!

Back at the Gary Jet Center, I was all buckled in and harnessed to my parachute. Mark the pilot was as casual as if we were taking the family car for a spin around the block. I was nervously chatty and completely regretting my decision to participate in this activity that was clearly meant for someone braver than I. It was not that I thought we were going to crash. I never thought I might die. I was just more concerned about throwing up.

It wasn't until we were rolling toward the runway that I realized there was virtually nothing in my little space of a cockpit for me to hold on to. I found one small bracket in front of me that I could awkwardly reach with my left hand. My right hand was in charge of the video camera.

We pulled on to the runway, swerving back and forth like the Indy cars do when they are warming up their tires. Mark said that's so he can see the other plane in front of him. If he didn't swerve, he wouldn't be able to see in front of the nose. Then, swerve away, I told him.

We lined up in formation with the two other AT-6 Texans of the Aeroshell team. Taking off and flying in formation was amazing. The takeoff was much smoother and less scary than in a passenger airplane.

Just the "normal" flying was beautiful. The sky was so blue. And the clear canopy over my head let me view everything around and above me. I could see Lake Michigan and the beach and all the patchwork pieces of land below us.

We were within 6 to 12 feet of the two other planes for the entire flight. I looked over and saw the passengers in the other planes and waved at them -- and they waved back! That's how close we were. It was kind of a Top Gun moment, only we weren't inverted and no one flipped the bird.

I also noticed that the pilot in the lead plane wasn't wearing a helmet. I said something to Mark into my microphone about that.

"He's not wearing helmet. His parents or his wife should give him heck for that!"

"Oh, he's not married," Mark replied. "And his parents don't like him much."

I laughed and then a few minutes later realized, "Wait a minute! I'm not wearing a helmet either!" That's when Mark said the helmets are more for communication than for safety. I guess if the plane were to go down, a helmet wouldn't help much anyway.

Just as I was really thinking I was glad I'd decided to do this and I couldn't believe how enjoyable it was, Mark said "Ok, here we go!"

I heard the engines of all three planes gunning and in an instant we went from a smooth forward motion to an incredibly fast, incredibly scary ascent straight up into the sky. I said "Oh sh*t!," followed by "Jesus, Mary, Joseph!" I grabbed my parachute with my left hand and held like mad onto the videocamera, which was still rolling, with my right hand.

Then we started to flip -- forwards or backwards I'm not sure because my eyes were closed. One of my Facebook friends said I should keep my eyes open so I didn't miss it, but I don't think that was even an option. The force of gravity pushing down against the plane climbing up was so strong. The video camera felt like it weighed 50 pounds.

Other than my first utterance as we were racing upwards, I didn't cuss. I didn't scream. Mostly because it's impossible to do either when you are not breathing.

The flip was over before I knew it. I was just getting air back into my lungs when Mark's voice came into my headphones and said, "And here we go with the roll..."

Again, my eyes closed and my breathing stopped. And again it was over so quickly. That's when I was sorry I'd missed it. I wished I'd kept my eyes open and thought about asking if we could do one more stunt. Then I decided maybe it was the lack of oxygen to my brain entertaining that idea and I should just keep quiet.

I looked out the window and saw circular smoke underneath us. I asked Mark if it was our trail, but he pointed out the 6 smaller, yellow Lima Lima precision planes flying below.

From there, we headed back to the Jet Center, me enjoying the beautiful, air around us. That is until without warning, we pealed up and off to the left. In hindsight, it wasn't really scary. Just startling in an "excuse me while I get my stomach out of my shoes" kind of way. We circled around and landed.

Mark swears the flight was about 15 minutes long. It seemed to start and finish in about 3 minutes to me. And it seemed like maybe it wasn't such a crazy thing to do after all. Maybe I will still dye my hair blue.

When we landed and Mark parked the plane back in its original location, Mike and the kids ran out to congratulate me. Annie and Charlie said I looked pale. Mike said he was jealous. Robbie said "let's get lunch."

We signed the Aeroshell log books and got an autographed picture from the team. Though I wasn't the least bit sick or queasy in the air, once I'd been on the ground for about 3 or 4 minutes, my legs started getting shaky and I felt the need to eat something -- fast. It was like the rapidly changing altitude and the battle with gravity caught up with me as the day went on.

I spent much of the ride home reclined and feeling a little woozy. Oh, and I think those g-forces must have had some kind of crazy intrauterine effect because my monthly visitor made an unexpected appearance later in the day as well (either that or I'm just a really bad calendar keeper).

I learned at least two things from this experience:

1. I am braver than I think I am.
2. I am a really terrible videographer.

I apparently kept zooming in on things (didn't mean too, honest!) during the flight. But thank goodness for a techy husband who likes to edit video. The first 1-2 minutes are of the pre-flight instructions. Followed by some funny photography Mike laid in -- but enjoy the nervous conversation I was having with Mark. When you start seeing the video going sideways, that's the roll! Just watching the video makes me get all nervous and hold my breath again. Enjoy!

One step closer to the craziest thing I've ever done

When I last left off, we had just arrived at the Gary Jet Center and my kids had been forbidden to say anything about any bodily functions that might inadvertently occur during my flight on a AT-6 Texan.

The Jet Center is a small private airport that see lots of corporate traffic from people doing business in or from Chicago and "the Region," as northwest Indiana is referred to. So while this crazy air show-related flight was a big deal to those of us going up, the folks at the Jet Center were a little inconvenienced by all the extra people milling around, possibly getting in the way of their real business.

I checked in with Erika from the South Shore Convention and Visitors Bureau who got me into this mess in the first place invited me to join this adventure. The kids (Mike being one of the kids here) were entertained to see several kinds of planes -- the Thunderbirds jets, the Lima Lima precision planes, the Texans and the Yak-52s lined up on the tarmac.

The Gary South Shore Air Show is what they call a deployed show. The planes take off from one location (the Jet Center), but perform at another location (over the beach on Lake Michigan). Within a few minutes, we met one of the air show volunteers, whose name escapes me now.

The volunteer was an Italian grandmotherly type. She told us that before our flight, we'd go over safety procedures with the pilot. When she said that we'd all be wearing parachutes, I didn't know whether to feel secure or scared sh*tless.

Grandma Airplane asked if anyone gets car sick. "If your stomach drops when you're on a roller coaster, that's normal," she said. "But if you have to sit in the front seat and hang your head out the window of the car on the highway, you might want to reconsider because it's no fun for us to have to stop everything to get you down and clean out the plane."

I told her I don't really get carsick, but I don't do roller coasters so I didn't know what my stomach would do. She had me really worried, but I wasn't about to change my mind. I'd already invested 150 miles and more than 3 hours in this adventure.

Then she took us out to get a closer look at the Texan:

Of all the planes on the tarmac, the Texans had the bulkiest body. Although I really wasn't nervous at this point, I was happy to have been assigned to the chubby plane. Probably because of my own size and shape, I've always been drawn to the stockier sorts. Plus, it just felt safer and, I reasoned, would be likely to roll and flip more slowly than those skinny little planes parked nearby.

Most of the folks in our group kept a reasonable distance from the planes, as the FAA was still on site inspecting them. Of course "most" does not include Mike, Robbie and Charlie who cozied up right next to the plane, checking out everything. I was only slightly mortified when one of the Jet Center employees rushed over to the air show volunteer and whispered something, after which the volunteer loudly announced that no one should touch the planes. In the boys' defense, it wasn't like they were climbing on the wing or spinning the propeller. But I kind of wanted to hide anyway.

After our meet and greet with the planes, it was back to the exterior of the Jet Center to wait for FAA clearance. The weather was perfect -- upper 70s, lower 80s, beautiful blue and not humid skies.

My new friend Cherie, aka the Queen of Free, had not yet arrived and I began to wonder if maybe she'd changed her mind. But soon enough she was there with her daughter, a friend, and most importantly to me, gum and non-drowsy Dramamine. Well, it was Wal-amine. She is a frugal blogger after all.

There was a quite a bit of waiting to be done. And then, suddenly, they were calling my name and it was showtime! I closely watched the people coming off the Texans before us, looking for any sign of green faces, rubbery legs or other indications that might suggest to me I should turn and run. But they -- a radio station intern, a photographer for the Chicago Tribune, and reporter for a northern Indiana newspaper -- seemed no worse for the wear. Well, they weren't fist pumping and clamoring for another ride, but they weren't kissing the ground either.

Mike went out with me to snap a few pictures. I realized afterward that I didn't hug and kiss the kids goodbye. I just slipped away while they were watching a huge transport plane that looked like a manatee with wings maneuver along with runway.

Amazingly, I still wasn't nervous. I was just excited about the opportunity. We would be flying with the Aeroshell team. I met Mark, my pilot, and after a quick introduction, he told me to go ahead and get in the plane.

I had to climb up onto the left wing, put my right foot on a hold in the side of the plane and climb in. Had I been any shorter than my 5-feet, 2-inches, I might have had to get a boost from behind.

Mike walked around to the other side of the plane to shoot video of Mark giving me the pre-flight instructions:

About the time Mark said "if you had to get out, you gotta do it yourself," I thought maybe I should get out of the plane NOW. But I didn't say anything other than "Ok. ok." and "I don't know what I've said yes to."

As I double checked the location of the sick bag, Mark climbed into his seat in front of me and Mike walked back to the Jet Center. I didn't kiss him goodbye either, which would have been hard to do from my ultra-buckled-attached-to-a-parachute spot in the back of the Texan. So it's a good thing I didn't die because I didn't kiss anyone before we took off. It's also a good thing I didn't die because I had to sign a waiver abdicating my right to sue should anything happen.

This was my view from the back seat:

I started talking a lot to Mark because I was nervous. I asked him if he was a praying man (yes) and assured him that I'd already said more than a few Hail Marys. I found out he's from Birmingham, Alabama, that he's been flying aerial acrobatic planes for 25 years, and that he doesn't like roller coasters. Really?! There's some hope for me!

Just about the time Mark powered up the engine, I thought maybe I should tell him I changed my mind. I envisioned myself tossing off the parachute, hopping from the plane and running like a mad woman for the Jet Center, where I would grab my kids, hop in the van, head home and tell everyone that the flight had been canceled on account of bad weather.

But because I wanted to save face more than I wanted escape certain nausea, I stayed put. Besides, I had a blog to write! Now you stay put for the dramatic conclusion to my aerial adventure.