How fantastical it must have been, in those first early years of flight, to know that people were slipping the surly bonds of Earth, cloud-high, with an omniscient narrator's view of the land far below. A hundred years on, as we remove shoes and try to squeeze one more little tube of liquid into a dinky plastic bag, huffing and outraged over 20 minute delays, it's hard to remember, much less feel in our bones, how thrilling it must have been. Finally, after we had dreamed going back to Leonardo, back to Icarus and even before that—finally, to fly.

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