Fasten Your Seatbelts: A Flight Attendant's Adventures 36,000 Feet and Below (27 page)

Back I went, ready for a battle. He was standing halfway through the cabin with his arms crossed also ready for battle.

I asked him, “What seems to be the problem here, sir?”

“I’ve paid for this ticket months in advance; I am not going to sit in a middle seat!” he yelled.

I looked at him with a pleasant but don’t-mess-with-me look and stated, “You have two choices here. We are completely full. You can either sit down now or take the next flight. What do you want to do, sir?”

He saw that I meant business, rolled his eyes like a spoiled little boy but sat down in his seat. He was complacent for the rest of the flight.

Another time, I would say I was on day six before the cycle. Completely emotional. I was outside the terminal pulling tickets for our flight. This particular city had a military base. I noticed a bunch of military personnel dressed in their fatigues. I asked one of them where they were going. “Desert storm,” he said. I took a gulp.

There were several boys with their families. They waited till the very last minute to board the aircraft. I watched as their fathers, mothers, wives, and children said goodbye to them not
knowing if it might be the last time they would ever see them again. Every time I heard a wail, my eyes filled with tears. I tried not to look at them, but I couldn’t help it. Finally, I could not contain my tears any more. I kept wiping drops off my cheek until the kind agent came over with a tissue. I thanked him.

The agent walked over to the families and said it was time to go. I hesitantly took the boys’ tickets while trying to hide my emotions. The families asked if I would take care of their loved ones on board. Tears welled up again. “I would,” I promised.

One day, on a day or two before the cycle, I was feeling like I needed to be left alone. Unfortunately, I was flying that day. I parked my car in the employee lot and took the bus to the airport. I did not want to go. Hesitantly, after entering the airport, I looked at the monitor to see where my flight was leaving. My body felt heavy as I moved. Slowly, I proceeded feeling sorry for myself the whole way to the gate. My airplane just arrived and all the passengers were still deplaning.

I walked over to the agent who was carrying a list of gate connections. Agents and flight attendants are peers; one has no authority over the other. I don’t know why, but in my PMS haze I asked her permission on where I sat, “Would you mind if I wait for the passengers to get off the aircraft, in those chairs over there? I’d rather not be around people as long as I can,” I chuckled. She looked at me condescendingly, “I don’t care
what you do!” she snapped. My PMS was absolutely furious.
What an evil person
!

I sat in a row of chairs away from the public eye, kicking myself for being such a wimp. Thank God my phone rang to break up my self-loathing. It was my mom. The passengers were now off the aircraft, so I casually headed down the jet bridge while talking to her. I smiled at the flight attendants who were getting off the airplane. A few seconds later, the same flight attendants were trying to get my attention. Behind them was that nasty gate agent screaming at me.
I had just about enough of her
.

I said, “Hold on, Mom.” I yelled right back at the agent in full PMS fury. “What, what do you want?” Apparently, she was taken aback by my aggressiveness.

“You can’t go on the aircraft; the cabin service will be cleaning soon,” she sniped.

“Excuse me, but I have been flying for a long time and I think I know what I can and cannot do,” I retorted.

The agent huffed, but backed down. I stepped on the airplane satisfied I regained my power.

My poor mom was still on the phone listening to the conversation. I’m sure she was horrified at her sweet daughter’s behavior. She has seen me that way only a couple of times. She always responds by saying, “That’s just the Leo in you.” It might be, but I always blame it on “PMS.”

t was the final leg of yet another brutal day with a completely full flight from Dallas/Ft. Worth to Fort Lauderdale. Needless to say the flight attendants were a little spent. The only good part about this leg was, we were going home.

As our boarding process began, I saw a uniformed crew member making her way through coach. When she approached me in the back galley, she introduced herself and stated the airplane was full and she would be taking a jumpseat. When you are non-reving (the employee benefit of flying free) and the airplane is full of passengers, an unpleasant option is to ride on the jumpseat. This is a really great benefit when you are trying to get somewhere, but we all know the working flight attendants would rather you not be there. We have a limited amount of space to work in the galley and the last thing we need is an extra body.

As I was busy crushing the ice, the flight attendant exited the restroom. “The toilet doesn’t have any water coming
down when you flush it,” she said. “You need to tell the captain to call maintenance.” I thought about it for a second. I have been flying for a long time and I know what happens when you call maintenance. A delay is somewhat inevitable. Because we were going home and it was the last flight of the night, I didn’t want to be delayed for a restroom that doesn’t flush. After all, being on a 757, there was a restroom just behind first class the coach cabin could use along with the other one in the back.

I told the flight attendant my concerns:

“Listen, if it was a safety related issue, I would not hesitate to call, or if it was a longer flight I would take immediate action, but a restroom on a two and a half hour flight?”

She looked at her watch and said sarcastically, “We do have twenty five minutes before departure.”

I grabbed the phone against my better judgment and called the captain. “We have a non-safety issue that really isn’t a big deal, but if maintenance could check to see if our toilet can be fixed easily, we would appreciate it. But, we don’t want to take a delay.”

Ten minutes before departure, we saw the mechanic heading our way. While explaining the situation I again stated, “If it is not an easy fix, we don’t want to be delayed; they can take care of it in Fort Lauderdale.” He walked in the restroom,
flushed the toilet two or three times and came out. “Nope, it’s not working; we’ll have to placard it.” This simply means it is out of service and will be taken care of at the next station. I knew I should have trusted my instincts because it took another twenty minutes for the paper to be filled out. Now, we were officially delayed.

Meanwhile, the first class flight attendant came to the back galley to see what was going on. I took no blame and pointed my finger at the non-revving flight attendant in a joking way: “She made me call.” They both agreed it was a bad idea, and I’m sure everyone learned something that night.

After about an hour into the flight and everyone’s beverage was taking effect, the line to the restroom was getting rather long. I directed some passengers to use the restroom behind first class and noticed several men waiting in line still in coach. I explained to the first male passenger that the out of order toilet would not flush.

I looked at him directly in the eye and said delicately, “If you don’t use any paper, you can still use that toilet.”

He said, “What you’re saying is, as long as I just give it a jiggle, we’re good to go.”

“That’s right,” I laughed.

He looked at me in a flirting way and said, “I think we have just bonded.”

All the other male passengers in line heard the exchange and that was the start of one crass joke after another! The “wiener” went to the young man who entered the lav singing KC and the Sunshine Band’s song, “shake, shake, shake… shake, shake, shake… shake your booty.”

ay 17, 2006. It was a 2-day trip, with a layover in Austin. The best part about this trip was that I would be flying with my good friend, Terry. Usually I have a feeling if something bad is going to happen on my flight, but I think because I looked forward to seeing my friend, I wasn’t aware of any negative vibes. I met the captain at the gate in Atlanta going to Dallas/Fort Worth. His name was Tim.

I asked, “When is the plane going to arrive?”

He looked at me and said with a smile, “How should I know?”

I pointed to the four stripes on his shirt and counted, “One-Two-Three-Four.”

He pointed to his four stripes and counted, “I-Don’t-Know-Anything.” We both cracked up.

He said, “I can tell I am going to get along with you just fine.” Little did we know this trip would bond us for the rest of our lives.

Our first leg was ATL-D/FW, the second D/FW-Nashville, the third Nashville-D/FW, and our last leg was D/FW-Austin. We made it to Dallas okay, but our Nashville leg was unfortunately, very eventful. We never made it to Austin.

While in D/FW, we boarded our three quarters full airplane on a Super-80 aircraft bound for Nashville, and pushed back from the gate. Lorraine, our number one flight attendant, began to make her PA announcements, letting Terry and I know it was time to do our manual safety demonstration with the seatbelt, safety card, and mask. Before we began the demo, Terry said a passenger stopped her and asked if she smelled anything burning. All three of us immediately stopped what we were doing and went about the cabin with our noses in the air.

I walked from the front of the aircraft, where I immediately smelled an electrical odor, to the very back row where I didn’t smell anything at all. As I walked to the forward part of the cabin, I could smell it faintly at row 12, but stronger in first class. All three of us detectives decided the most pungent area was first class. No passengers were sitting in the aisle seats of 4B or 5B, so Terry climbed on 5B and said she believed it was strongest above 5AB’s overhead bin. I climbed up on 4B and took a whiff of 4AB and then 5AB. No doubt about it: It was definitely above 5AB. We informed Captain Tim. He didn’t hesitate to return to the gate.

As soon as we opened the aircraft door, the mechanics immediately threw their bodies back. “Wooo, do you smell that?” The agent made a PA announcement requesting all passengers deplane with carryon items and bags. Due to the situation, I was sure the agent thought as we did, this plane would go out of service.