I was pottering about in the shed today, fixing my tractor (it burnt a valve), and listening to A Prairie Home Companion on the radio. Now, my shed is very old, and so is my tractor, and pretty much everything else is too. Stepping into it, you suddenly lose a few decades, and you land in, if I had to guess, the early forties. I like this. Everybody should have a shed, but I digress.

I was just getting the springs back onto the valves when a low growl caught my ear. It wasn't terribly remarkable, maybe a semi coming down the road. But it grew louder and more penetrating, and in the time it took me to sit up, this growl had transitioned to a rumble and was well on its way to a full roar. I realized that it was an aircraft, but not any little GA craft, no! Whatever it was, the engine on it was round, and bigger than any I had ever heard before!

I dropped my tools and tried to get up, but before I could, it flew squarely over me! I saw the shadow streak by on the grass outside the door; the entire structure shook and rattled, the wrenches on the tractor hood buzzed and clattered to the floor. I shook too, part from the great throaty rumble that enveloped and deafened me, and part the rising giddiness that swept over as I tumbled out of the shed to see the plane go by, flying out over the hills and turning to the sea. I knew it at once, I have a picture of it over my desk at work - a Douglas Dauntless divebomber, pulling through the sky with a thundering Wright Cyclone, 1200 horsepower at the pilot's disposal.

I jumped up and down, danced a bit, and shouted to my dog, Champ, who was puzzled, to say the least, at my unusual display.

The plane flew near or over Walker's Point, and came back for a repeat buzz twice more, and I stood cheering each time.

Now, as I write this, it occurs to me how incredible it is that this should happen, this little moment of time-travel. It gave me an insight: Consider the normal person in 1943, working in a shed, or in a field, or a soldier on the other side, and hearing this noise sweep over you before you could do anything about it, the powerful joy or terror sweeping up your spine, the vibration making your entire body and mind shake as though it were going to shatter, rendering you helpless to do anything. If I thought that plane had come for me, I would cry like a child. Without question.

I don't know any other sound that could have such a profound effect.

I want one.