I thought I would share a Skytress story to start this post today. After all, ….I am a Skytress.

One day we were boarding the plane. I was in the galley making drinks for our on-ground beverage service for the first-class passengers. My fellow Skytress was taking the drinks out into the cabin. I had placed a beer next to the silver tray that held other drinks I had made to take out. Well, there was a break in the boarding process. A much coveted occurrence in the boarding process when you have to take the drinks out. So my fellow Skytress told me she was going to run the beer out to the passenger while I was making the last drink. Fortunately for me, when I finished making the last drink there was still no passengers at the boarding door. So, out I flew into the cabin. There was a female passenger standing at the last row in first-class heading to the main cabin. The last row was where my fellow Skytress was heading. I know my fellow Skytress wanted to get the drinks delivered before the next wave of passengers started boarding. So she reached around the female passenger to hand the beer to the gentlemen sitting on the aisle in the last row. As the Skytress reached around the woman, her bracelet got caught in the woman’s hair. The woman yelled, “Oh, my hair!”. Oh horror of horrors. My fellow Skytress was pulling the woman’s wig off!! The first-class passengers went silent. My fellow Skytress backed up into me as I stood with the tray full of drinks. I instantly broke out in a nervous sweat. Not because the liquids were sloshing out of the cups. No, I got a bad case of the giggles. My brain was shouting…”Retreat to the galley! Retreat to the galley!”. So, I retreated to the galley. And I started praying for the well-being of my fellow Skytress. Seconds later my fellow Skytress was in the gallery. She said, “Thanks for leaving me alone out there”. I apologized as sincerely as I could. Then she put her hand on my shoulder and said, “Girl, can you believe I did that?”. We looked at each other and doubled over in laughter. Not loud laughter. Silent laughter. The kind where you cover you mouth and plug your nose so no sound comes out. Our bodies shook. We feared the first-class passengers were listening. And although we were in the galley, I believe the passengers were silently laughing in their seats, too. Eventually my fellow Skytress told me the lady was really cool about the situation. The lady told her not to worry…she would just put her wig back in place. And she did.

I hope you liked that story. My Skytress stories will come from the Skytress vault for awhile. I will not fly again until August. I decided, like so many of my fellow Skytresses, Skyters and fellow airline family members, to take an unpaid company leave. As you know, airline bookings are down dramatically. My last day I flew was March 9th. I was about to start several weeks of vacation. At that time my flights were three-fourths full. Passengers were wiping down their seat areas and themselves so thoroughly one would think they were about to perform surgery on their tray tables. I could see the writing on the airplane fuselage. Things were going to get worse soon. And they did.

I was planing on picking up a trip at the end of March. But, I had a feeling I should wait. I’m glad I did. Passengers were canceling their trips. My company started losing 60 million dollars a day. So to slow the money hemorrhage, my company started canceling flights. They offered leaves for April to try to save money. I had great intentions to fly in April. Then I saw most of my commuter flights canceling. My trip rotations for the month were showing most of my flights cancelled. In 30 years I have never seen anything like it. So, I put my trips in the computer for another Skytress or Skyter to pick them up. Thankfully some beautiful souls did.

I decided before the end of March to take a three- month leave. It was a hard decision. I flew after 9-11. It was one of the best experiences of my flying career. I was determined to fly these next few months to be there not only for my company, but, for my fellow crew members. Then our CEO said the best thing we could do to help the company was to take a leave. We have almost 25,500 Skytresses and Skyters . Almost 16,000 volunteered to take unpaid leaves to help save our company. Many more in the company took leaves, too. I know the last thing we all wanted to do was to step away for awhile. We are dedicated to our passengers, to our company and to each other. But to say I am so proud of everyone, is an understatement. My thoughts and prayers are with those who are still working. They are our warriors on the front-line. Not enough praise can bestowed on them, in my opinion.

Today I put my crew bags away. I haven’t done that in years. Airline people never put their bags away. Their bags are usually like mine, in their bedrooms or in their guest rooms waiting to be zipped up to head to the airport. Stowing my crew bags was more emotional than I expected. I closed the guest room closet door knowing I will peek in there a few times before August. It’s hard to say goodbye to something that has faithfully followed you for years. These bags and I have been through a lot these past few years.

Funny, I did leave a lot of things in my crew bags. After all, it has taken me 30 years to pack the perfect items for the “just in case” situations. I can’t tell you how many times I have taken down my stowed crew bags from the overhead bins to grab something to help “fix” a situation. My running joke is, “What is the one thing you bring to a deserted island?”….. a flight attendant with their crew bags! You could survive a very long time with the stuff they have in their crew bags.

I know in a few months I will be joining my airline family again. I will drag my crew bags out of the closet and throw a few more things in them. A few extra hand wipes for the hotel layovers. A few extra snacks until restaurants open up again. A few extra pens and paper, too. I always say Skytresses and Skyters show up everyday to work just to see what crazy thing will happen next. I need to be ready to write in case another Skytress accidentally pulls a passenger’s wig off her head. I will absolutely report it back to you all.

Birthdays are a funny thing. Some people love them. Some people hate them. My brother Brian loves them. Especially his own. Brian starts talking about his next birthday after he blows out the candles on his current cake.

This Saturday Brian will turn 39. Last year he told us he’d like to skip turning 39. Not because he didn’t want to turn 39. No, he wanted to move on to 40. Brian knows turning 40 comes with a much bigger celebration.

My brother Brian has Down Syndrome. He has 1 extra chromosome more than the rest of us. That extra chromosome is filled with extra love, extra kindness, extra happiness, extra laughter, extra hugs, and an extra love of birthdays.

I remember the first time I saw my brother. I was 13- years old. Up to that day, I had been “the baby” of the four Gaffney children. When I first saw him, my brother wasn’t in the nursery like all the other babies I had seen on TV and in the movies. And he wasn’t swaddled in a hospital blanket. He was in the neonatal intensive care unit. He was hooked up to monitors and had a multitude of tubes going into his little body. He was on a small bed with heaters over him. My dad explained to me in a very comforting voice, that in addition to my brother having Down Syndrome, he also had some other medical issues the doctors were checking into. My Dad told me that it was okay to touch my brother and talk to him. That my brother would like to meet me. And so I did. A few minutes later a nurse came in and asked my Dad if they had decided on a name for my brother. My Dad turned to me and asked , “What do you think we should name him?”. Wow. My Dad was giving me the honor of naming my brother. I knew the names on my parents name list. But, I wasn’t sure if they had made a final decision. My heart raced. I took a deep breath. And I said, “Brian Christopher.” My Dad smiled and turned to the nurse and said, ” It’s Brian Christopher Gaffney”. And that is how my brother got his name.

The next day Brian was transferred to Cardinal Glennon Children’s Hospital. It’s one of the best Children’s hospitals in the country. Brian not only had Down Syndrome, he had an enlarged spleen, a hole in his heart, and an extremely rare form of leukemia. Fortunately for us, Brian’s doctor had experience with his type of leukemia. We found out Brian would eventually grow out of the leukemia. No treatment was necessary. While my brother was at Cardinal Glennon, my parents went back and forth everyday to see him. The hospital was 30 minutes from our house. My Mom used to say the car could drive itself back and forth with all the trips they made to the hospital. And weeks later, with my brother wearing the outfit I had bought him, the car did drive Brian home.

Brian met our family friends the first day he was home. From that day forward Brian has been a special part of their families, too. We’ve all celebrated Brian’s birthdays together. Our friends have done the most amazing things with and for Brian. I swear that little laugh of Brian’s makes people’s hearts smile. Brian will never know the incredible impact he has had on so many lives. But, for those of us that have been touched by him, we do know the incredible blessings he has given us.

Brian attended the same elementary and middle school, as me. We graduated from the same high school, too. While in high school, Brian swam on the swim team. Growing up, Brian learned to play hockey and traveled the country with his team. In addition, Brian learned to ski and ride horses. But, his true love is music. It doesn’t matter the genre. Pop, rock, country, Motown, musicals, Brian loves it all. Brian always requests CD’s for all his gifts. Surprisingly, Brian also loves college marching band music. When Brian asked for college marching band CD’s for Christmas we all laughed. His beaming smile on Christmas when he opened his CD”s was worth the hours spent on the computer looking for them . The next year when he asked for more, we were back on the computer finding the CD’s.

Brian has been working at our grocery store for 15 years. It’s his paying job. His favorite job is working up at the high school with the sports teams. When my Dad was alive he inquired about Brian helping out with the sports teams. The athletic director and coaches agreed. These days Brian lives for the football season. He loves leading the team out on to the field and getting the folks in the stands to cheer. Brian has been working with the sports department for over 25 years now. He loves the athletes and the coaches. Some of Brian’s most memorable birthdays are those the sports teams have thrown in his honor.

Our family started weeks ago counting the days until Brian’s 39th birthday. We have our gifts purchased. Including more CD’s, of course. We have the decorations ready. We have the birthday dinner planned. I know what type of cake Brian would like me to make. I even have special candles for his cake. Happily, I know when Brian blows out his candles, he will start planning his 40th birthday. He knows 40 is a special birthday for him. What he may not realize is, every one of his birthdays have been extra-special for us.

The 1st self-quarantine Easter has come and gone. It wasn’t all that bad. I must say, however, it was the 1st Easter Mass I attended in my pajamas. I won’t lie. I was very comfortable watching the Mass while lying on my bed. My hair was a complete mess. I still had morning crusties in the corner of my eyes. However, my heart was in the right place. I did miss seeing the congregation in their Easter outfits. But, I quite enjoyed not worrying days before about what I was going to wear on Easter. I also happily discovered when I watched Easter Mass on-line, I paid more attention to the readings and the Gospel. I also prayed a little harder, too. This fact made me smile. I think it made God smile, too.

This past Friday my family colored Easter eggs. It’s our family tradition to color eggs on Good Friday. I remember several years ago my family had to rush downstairs just before we started to color eggs. The tornado sirens started blaring. We found out later a tornado had touched down by the airport. Fortunately, no one was injured. It was a great Good Friday. I think about that tornado every Good Friday. Thankfully, this Good Friday was tornado free.

You know, I don’t care how old I get, I still enjoy coloring Easter eggs. Yes, I still color eggs. I color the last of the eggs when everyone else gets tired of waiting for their eggs to turn the perfect color and they leave the kitchen. This happened when I was a child, too. We kids would get excited to color eggs. However, there were usually too many kids, too many eggs, and not enough colors. We’d eventually get bored waiting for our turn to color again and we’d leave with the kitchen . We knew coloring eggs had officially ended when someone would make the khaki colored egg. The egg that got the full-color treatment. It got put in all the colors. We never knew who was going to make the khaki egg. We just knew someone was going to make it. And we all came back to see it done. It always made us smile. I think it made God smiled, too.

On Saturday I took out the Easter baskets. These baskets have been in our family for years. However, these baskets haven’t always been the most coveted Easter baskets. The coveted baskets weren’t even baskets. They were paper lunch bags. We called them “poverty Easter Baskets”. I know calling an Easter basket “a poverty Easter basket” is not politically correct these days. It wasn’t politically correct to call it that back then, either. But one of us kids coined the name and it stuck. Unlike the beautiful baskets with a handle and a bow, these lunch bags were brown with the tops turned down a cuff or two.

You see, when we were younger my family would spend Easter with our dear family friends. Depending on the year, there could be 10 kids or more for Easter. Our friends would travel from out of town. Some would drive. Others would fly. Getting their families to St. Louis was their main concern. Bringing Easter baskets was not.

I believe the lunch bag Easter baskets were a last-minute decision made by our Mother’s. I’m sure it was made at midnight when they realized they had too many kids and not enough Easter baskets. Fortunately for us, our Mother’s did feel some guilt about the basket issue. They compensated by putting less Easter grass in the bags and more candy in them. We loved our brown paper bag baskets. Each Easter we would get excited for our bags. We always knew what bag belonged to each other. We never ate the candy out of someone else’s bag. However, my dad would peek in the bags and eat everyone’s black jelly beans. They were his favorite. They were not anyone else’s favorite. So we were grateful he ate them. To this day, when someone mentions the poverty Easter baskets and the wonderful memories of us spending the holiday together, we laugh and we smile. I think this makes God smile, too.

The tradition of the Easter bag carried on when I started flying. As a new Skytress or Skyter you knew you were going to fly the holidays. I’ve had the pleasure of spending Easter with my airline family many times. I always brought a gift for my crews no matter the holiday. I believed, if we were going to be away from our families, I was going to make the holiday special for my crew the best way I could.

I did upgrade the Easter basket bag for my crews. I always picked a spring-colored gift bag with handles. I couldn’t bring myself to put the Easter grass in the bags. I had horrible visions of the hotel cleaners cursing the crews if the grass was all over the hotel floors. So I would fill the bags up with candy and fluff tissue paper on the top. My crews would always be surprised when I gave them their Easter basket bags. Their gift to me was seeing their beautiful smiles. I think this made God smile, too.

Yesterday after Mass I called and texted my family and friends. I knew everyone would be at home with their families. It would be a different holiday for everyone. I called and texted more than I would have on previous Easters. My family and friends talked about watching Easter services on-line. We chuckled about the khaki eggs. And we laughed about the Easter bag baskets. I felt closer to my family and friends this Easter than I have in a long time. The love and laughter I shared this Easter definitely made me smile. Without a doubt, I know it made God smile, too.

INAUGURAL FLIGHT

What is a Skytress?

I’ve been called a lot of things in my life. Only once was I called a Skytress.

It all happened on my layover in Jacksonville after checking into the hotel. My fellow flight attendant and I decided to go to the gas station next to the hotel to get dinner. Ah, the glamorous part of my job no one tells you about. Anyhow, we walked through the parking lot and went through the bushes on a dirt path clearly made by fellow airline crew going off for a hearty meal. Before we knew it, we were standing in the Subway Sandwich line inside the gas station.

As we approached the sandwich area, there was a customer being waited on. The gentleman behind the counter was busily making his sandwich. As we waited, I slipped into deep contemplation. “What type of bread should I get? What type of Sun Chips goes best with a Veggie Delight?”. The cheery man behind the counter shouted out to us, “Are you ladies Skytresses?”. I looked at my fellow flight attendant. She looked back at me just as confused. In my sweetest flight attendant voice I said, “Excuse me?”. To which the gentleman asked again, “Are you ladies Skytresses?”. There was another awkward pause as we all looked at each other. The man innocently asked a third time, “Aren’t you ladies Skytresses? You know, waitresses in the sky”. Now I’ve been called a flight attendant, a stewardess and even a trolley dolly. Never had I been called a Skytress. I loved it!

I couldn’t get back on that dusty trail and go through those bushes back to my hotel room fast enough. “I’m a Skytress” swirled through my head. I was giddy. I felt like a super hero. Instead of a cape, I had wings. I called my boyfriend Ron and told him the whole story. He laughed. He laughed even harder when I pointed out to him that he was a Skyter. A waiter in the sky.

The Blog Gets It’s Wings

As you may know, there are some books written about flight attendants and their careers. They are usually written by flight attendants. And the truth be told, they are mostly read by flight attendants, too. At some point in our careers flight attendants talk about these books. These conversations usually lead to what stories we would tell if we were to write a book. And we always discuss what we would call our books. My favorite book title came from a fellow flight attendant in Cincinnati. He was going to write a book and call it “How I survived 40 Years of Menopause “. I still chuckle when I think about this.

Although I love to write, I knew I could never write a book. Between flying, commuting, and trying to whittle down my list of things to do, I’d never have the time. But, I always thought I could write a blog. Yes, a blog would be doable. I knew I would call my blog “The Rerouted Skytress “. One day I told my Skyter boyfriend about my idea. He encouraged me to start the blog. Thus, many nights on my layovers I would lie in bed trying to sleep and ideas would pop into my head. When this would happen I’d always flip the lights on and write my ideas down on the hotel notepads. After many layovers I collected a lot of little notepad papers. I’d always place them in the extra pocket of my suitcase. My blog was getting wings. I was so happy.

The Worst Reroute

On July 30, 2018, I got one of the worst reroutes of my life. It didn’t come from Crew Scheduling. It came from God himself. He took my beautiful Skyter Ron’s airline wings and exchanged them for his angel wings. He was two days away from turning 51. Ron was now flying with the angels using his new Heavenly wings. I was left here on Earth with just my Skytress wings. Ron and my future together was canceled. Flight cancellations are bad. Life cancellations are awful awful awful.

Departure Time

It has taken me a long time to want to start a blog again. However, the past few months I have been receiving angel signs from my handsome Skyter. Every morning and every night I looked at my Skyter’s pictures on my dresser and wondered what he was trying to tell me. Then God gave us all a reroute. COVID-19. We had to self-quarantine. I saw friends and family thinking outside the box to stay connected. They had to be creative to feed their souls under quarantine. I did too. All my angel signs were making sense now. I knew without a doubt it was time for me to start my blog.

Crew Assistance

I asked my nieces if they knew anything about starting a blog. My one niece suggested I check out YouTube. I knew then starting a blog was considered old school. Now I feel like I am back at initial flight attendant training. However, instead of learning to deploy a raft in a ditching, I’m learning how to get these words on my actual blog. Getting my pictures on the blog is definitely going to take a crew effort.

Taking Flight

So this is my inaugural flight of The Rerouted Skytress blog. I don’t know if anyone else will join me on my blog. I’m okay with this possibility. A ferry flight- a flight with no passengers- is still a flight. Thus, a blog with no readers is still a blog.

Yes, there will be more blogs to come. My topics will be as diverse as the trips I have flown these past 30 years. It will be an adventure for sure. This blog is taking flight. As the note my beloved Skyter gave me says, …”Let’s have a great trip”. I couldn’t agree more.