The One-Eyed Pilot

While writing my story about golfing, I was reminded of another story that always makes me smile. I hope you will too.

My husband Pat and I both started working at Frigidaire Company right out of college. For several of the years that Pat worked there, he worked with a woman named Shelby. Shelby dated an older man and occasionally the four of us would go out together.

Shelby’s boyfriend, Earl, had a glass eye. But he was also a pilot. Pat asked Shelby once if a one-eyed person was legally allowed to fly a plane. She answered that it was legal as long as the one-eyed pilot had a co-pilot.

One day, Shelby told Pat that Earl was flying them down to Gatlinburg, Tennessee, the next weekend and asked he and I would like to join them.

“Well, I thought you said Earl needed a co-pilot in order to fly,” Pat said.

“Oh, Earl has a friend who is a pilot who will be flying down with us. Actually, they serve as each other’s co-pilots. He only has one eye too.”

What?! Isn’t the purpose of a co-pilot for a one-eyed pilot to provide some depth perception or something that might be lacking with one-eyed vision?

So, while it may have been legal for them to fly, I had no intention of flying from Columbus to Gatlinburg with two one-eyed pilots. Pat told Shelby we had other plans.