February 2025

Driving on the Moon

It is now common knowledge that the moon is in fact not made of cheese. But if I were ever chosen to participate on one of the future NASA missions to the moon, I would take along a charcuterie board just in case.

Lately, I have been hardcore nerding out on the ambitious Apollo missions to the moon. I find it fun to daydream about being the astronaut sitting in the chair with 10 seconds to go before liftoff. Knowing my luck that would be the exact moment I would have grave misgivings about eating Taco Bell for breakfast. The rocket strapped to my back weighs 6.5 million pounds and will soon gobble up fuel at 20 tons a second. I’m strapped to an organized and mostly orderly bomb constructed in a relative hurry to meet a deadline imposed by a fallen president. If this bomb chooses not to explode around me, I’ll be on my way to the moon at 25000 mph, probably faster than any Cessna I have ever flown. Then after 3 days of eating freeze-dried hotdogs and Tang, my coworker and I would climb down an expensive ladder and make history. I would be standing on the face of the moon, with the keys to the lunar rover, ready to drive flat out with no police in sight.

In my imagination, driving on the moon would be both simpler and more complex than driving in Lancaster, PA. For one, there would be no buggies that you would need to navigate, and the road apple debris would be less. You would not have GPS on the moon or a smartphone, but I guess you could just turn around and follow the only manmade tracks for miles back to your spaceship.

Soon we will be leaving the road apple-laden land of Lancaster and starting off on our own expedition. Our destination will not be the giant lump of cheese in the night sky, but somewhere still very much alien to us. Our “rocketship” will only fly at a meager 500 mph, but we will still probably be served the same Tang and freeze-dried hotdogs as those other explorers. Instead of climbing down an expensive ladder like Buzz did, we will be climbing down a worn-out Jet stair truck.

We are headed to Zambia! Flying Mission Zambia has invited us to join their team as a maintenance specialist (a fancy way to say mechanic) starting ASAP. I will not be going as a pilot for our first term, due to my failed TE at JAARS. However, I will test with MAF between our 1st and 2nd terms to see if I qualify as a field pilot then.

Flying Mission Zambia is based in the capital city of Lusaka, and they serve as a link to Doctors, Missionaries, and the many field clinics sprinkled throughout the Zambian countryside. The country of Zambia when laid over the East coast is from the top of Maine to the south of DC, and goes west to mid-Ohio. Throughout this landscape lives 20 million people, and many Zebras. When at MMS in 2021, I joined a team that traveled to Flying Mission Zambia to perform larger maintenance projects on their fleet. I really enjoyed my time there, getting to know both the foreign and domestic staff that make up the vibrancy of FMZ.

So what’s next? Next is waiting for our work permits and visas. Imagine the speed and efficiency of the DMV. Then after those get approved it’s buying tickets, neck pillows, and as much scrapple as I can carry, and depart to Zambia.
This does bring up an interesting topic: Things that will be changing.

This will probably be the next to last paper Flyin’ Bryan newsletter. Scan the QR code to sign up for our Telegram newsletter. I will still post full newsletters to our website but the Telegram newsletter will be updated more often.

We are going to miss everyone as we move. But no matter where we move we’ll serve the same King, under the same moon. Gotta go, I am craving cheese.

PRAYER

Please remember us in prayer over these next several months as big things are happening! We are packing up roughly 600 pounds of stuff to travel over four continents with four children, and I for one feel a little stressed. This is what all the preparation was for, and I feel so grateful for everyone who is walking beside us as we take this next step. One hardship facing us is, we will be getting rid of our precious minivan and we will become a… SUV family! Needless to say, many big changes lie ahead, and it will be fun, exciting, lonely, and disappointing. We all will feel this, so please especially pray for our children.

Pray that we will find a good church in Zambia. It is absolutely important that we find a good church to plug into for our long-term spiritual health.

Pray for my friend’s family. My friend was killed in a tragic work accident in January. He was a great man and has left a legacy for his boys.

PRAISE

Praise that things seem to be coming together. Lately, I felt like God had us in a perpetual holding pattern. But now things are all coming together, and I am finally feeling cleared to land.

Till next time,