The first day of fall was on Saturday. I couldn’t be happier. Skytresses and Skyters know summertime flying is the hardest flying of the year. Our airplanes are full. Plus, Mother Nature loves to send nasty weather anywhere our airplanes are headed. Thus, reroutes are inevitable. Needless to say, our schedules are packed with trips, whether we want them to be or not. Skytresses and Skyters can become quite exasperated with summertime flying if they don’t have a vacation to break up the summertime craziness. I’ll admit. I no longer take a summer vacation. So, I swear the four months of summertime flying actually feels like three years for me. I typically try to block out the fact it is summertime flying. Heck. There are many summers I don’t recollect. Skytresses and Skyters like to reminisce about how bad summer flying was the previous years. Astonishingly, I recall nothing. Except for the fact I survived each summer of flying. Egads. I don’t need to remember the details of how awful the flying was or how I survived it all. The mere fact I survived is good enough for me.
I’m confident I will remember most of my flying this summer simply because I was flying Anchorage trips. Flying Anchorage trips can’t be categorized as typical summertime flying. No siree. One doesn’t survive Anchorage trips, one relishes every spectacular moment. However, there are a few non-Anchorage trips I’d like to forget…and with a few more fall days under my belt, I most certainly will. Thankfully for you, my brain won’t release these summertime memories just yet. Heck. I still have flashbacks to my Denver trip. As Ron would say, that trip was awful, awful, awful. Yes, indeed. My crew and I were rerouted to work a flight to LaGuardia because the original crew timed out. Of course, we were informed about our reroute as we were about to head to our hotel for a layover after a long day of flying. Ultimately, we stayed on the airplane at the gate with passengers for several hours because of storms and lightning in the Denver area. Then we timed out because we reached our 15 hour duty limitation. Incredibly, the flight was never canceled. No siree. The flight was delayed until we had our legal rest. Then we reunited with the same passengers who spent the night in the Denver airport and worked the flight to JFK. Yes. I said JFK. JFK was the original destination of the passengers the day before…only Mother Nature forced the hands of those in charge and miraculously a JFK destination became a LaGuardia destination. Since Mother Nature was feeling much better after a night of raging storms, our LaGuardia flight reverted back to JFK. I know. It’s crazy. Just as crazy was the 10,000 steps my crew and I logged between our arrival gate in JFK to our gate for our deadhead flight back to Atlanta. Fortunately, we made this flight in the nick of time. I thank my angels in Reroute Heaven for this miracle. Yessiree. Thanks to them I was able to catch the last flight home and I wasn’t forced to spend the night in the crew lounge……again.
Spending the night in the crew lounge is never fun. This kind of slumber party is never really a party. For one thing, it means you missed your flight home. For another thing, there isn’t any slumber. There is commiseration though with other Skytresses and Skyters in the same situation. So, at least there is that. My slumber party was the direct result of a lack of communication on the part of the crew van company. They never communicated to a driver to pick us up after we got rerouted and had to layover in downtown Atlanta. Incredibly, our airline had communicated with the crew van company numerous times the day before and that morning to make sure we had a driver scheduled. Fortunately, a kind gentleman driver was rerouted to pick us up after he picked up two pilots across the street. Unfortunately, the delay in our pickup caused us to get stuck in the atrocious Atlanta afternoon traffic. Our flight to West Palm Beach was put on a rolling delay until we made it to the airport. Unfortunately, the delay enabled Mother Nature to whip up a nasty storm over West Palm Beach for our arrival. It felt like an eternity waiting for Mother Nature to give up on her weather wrath. My flight home was long gone by the time we landed back in Atlanta. Don’t feel too bad for me though. I slumbered in the crew lounge with my Skytress friend Kellie who missed her flight home because of weather. Yessiree. We sat in our makeshift chair- beds and talked most of the night. I, also talked with my commuter Skytress friend, Agnes. Agnes and her crew had been rerouted. They were hanging out in the crew lounge waiting for a hotel assignment. Their Skytress In-Charge waited on hold for several hours for crew accommodations to answer…so, Agnes and I had plenty of time to chitchat. After Agnes and her crew left I kept myself entertained by watching the reactions of the Skytresses and Skyters as they came into the crew lounge to start their duty day. They were shocked to see the crew lounge had become a makeshift hotel for ill-fated Skytresses and Skyters. My luck did rebound a wee bit on my flight home. I was blessed to have a wonderful crew working my flight. I did have to sit on the jumpseat after my slumber-less party in the crew lounge. But, I was blessed I had the jumpseat. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have made it home that day either. Yessiree. Every flight home was full. Every jumpseat home was booked. Ah, the joys of summertime flying!
My last trip before my vacation I, also, went illegal due to duty limitation rules. I’ll admit. I was hopeful we would go unscathed by the reroute gods on this trip. Yes. On our last day we were scheduled to fly to Newark before we flew back to Atlanta to finish our trip. Still, I had high hopes we’d make it to Atlanta on time. Heck. I was even hoping for an early arrival. Mother Nature must have caught wind that I was going on vacation for a few weeks and it put her in a foul mood. Yessiree. She wouldn’t have an opportunity to put another devious weather system in my path for awhile and it obviously ticked her off. So, what did she do? Well, she created a weather system so evil that it caused ground stoppages in Newark….for hours. Part of her sinister plan was to initially give us all hope that we would make it to Newark on time. I’ll admit. I sat on my jumpseat with a huge smile on my face when the Captain announced we were number three for takeoff. In a few short hours I would officially be on vacation. Alleluia! I now know the sound I thought was the engines revving up was actually Mother Nature’s guttural laughter reverberating outside the airplane as she flipped her weather switch. Egads. Mother Nature caused such a weather frenzy air traffic control in Newark was forced to extend numerous ground stoppages The extended ground stoppage then forced scheduling to reroute us. Instead of going to Atlanta, we would be laying over in Newark. Yessiree. Scheduling had given up any hope that we would make it back to Atlanta. Unfortunately, this awful reroute would get me back home to St. Louis mid- afternoon the next day. Of course, The Rerouted Skytress found this reroute unacceptable. So, I put in a request with my angels in Reroute Heaven. I knew there was a morning flight from Detroit to St. Louis that I could take home. However, I needed to layover in Detroit for this to happen. Well, alleluia. My angels in Reroute Heaven made it happen. I’ll admit. They had a hard plan to execute. Mother Nature is a formidable opponent. She kept giving the powers that be hope that the weather would clear up. Thankfully, Reroute Heaven stalled her weather system with heavenly force. In the end my crew and I had to wait several more excruciating hours at the gate with our passengers. But, we eventually hit the maximum duty time of 15 hours. Scheduling released us to go to the airport hotel in Detroit. They also granted my deviated from our scheduled deadhead to Atlanta in the morning. Yessiree. I would be able to take a flight directly home to St. Louis. I’ll admit. I’m not a fan of my 3-day trips turning into a 4-day trip. Especially when I am going on vacation. Nonetheless, I was grateful. I was grateful for my angels in Reroute Heaven. I was grateful I was going on vacation. I was grateful I wouldn’t see an airport for weeks. Mostly, I was grateful I survived my 34th year of summer flying.
Sadly, this vacation hasn’t been without sorrow. It is with a heavy heart that I am writing this blog. Ron’s dad passed away on September 13th. Papa Ed, as I affectionately called him, was the kindest, most caring, sweet-witted gentleman. He religiously read my blog and faithfully commented on each one. Words cannot express how much this meant to me. I loved texting Papa Ed when I was about to start a trip. Ron used to text his Dad his whereabouts when he was out flying. Every once in awhile Ron would mistakenly send the text to me instead of his Dad. This always made me laugh. Without fail, it made me appreciate Ron’s beautiful relationship he had with his Dad even more. I always hoped Ron was smiling in Heaven as I continued his tradition of texting Papa Ed where I was headed on my trips. I always felt Papa Ed’s fatherly love when he would text me back and tell me to be safe and to have a good trip. Papa Ed’s texts and phone conversations always made my Irish eyes smile. Usually he would pass along a story about Ron that would either make me laugh out loud or deeply touch my heart. Inevitably, Papa Ed’s stories would make me love Ron and the Paden family even more. I know without a doubt God compassionately had Papa Ed help me with my grief. I pray I helped Papa Ed with his grief, too. I know Papa Ed is in Heaven with Ron and Mama Linda. I can only imagine the glorious reunion that took place when Papa Ed entered Heaven. I like to think Ron has lovingly moved another seat into his Reroute Heaven office so Papa Ed can sit beside him. I know Papa Ed will enthusiastically assist Ron, Mama Linda and my Dad work their reroute magic whenever it is imperative. Without a doubt, I will continue to marvel at their creativity and dedication to make sure The Rerouted Skytress is lovingly taken care of. I am truly blessed that God continues to let my angels manage the Reroute Heaven office. I know God has graciously left them to their own devices, too. I am utterly grateful for this autonomy. Yessiree. With God’s backing and their perseverance I have been the recipient of many Heavenly reroute miracles. I may say I don’t know how I survived summer flying. But, I really do. God and my angels in Reroute Heaven are the ones I need to thank. With Papa Ed as the newest member in the Reroute Heaven department I may become a huge fan of summer flying. Or at least loathe it less….Which is still a miracle in my book.