When I was a little girl I believed that fireflies were fairies. I believed in fairy tales, and true love, and all of the other unconventional things that little girls believe in. I believed in MAGIC. Like many other little girls experience, that magic slipped away for me as I grew. I grew up and fell into the mold of the modern-day woman: 1) Get a 9-5 Job. 2) Find a Husband. 3) Make Babies. 4) Repeat step three until you have a girl, two boys, and a cocker spaniel! I tried to follow this makeshift plan for my life throughout college and ended up graduating with honors, right on track. The part that people don’t tell you is that there is no track, and sometimes things don’t go as you plan (and maybe they shouldn’t…).
My job search following college had left me confused and disillusioned. It felt like the best that I could give just wasn’t quite good enough. I kept trying. I kept looking for jobs in the field that I majored in, but there was something in my heart telling me that I was looking in the wrong place. I found myself looking at the future like a gloomy path of monotonous days that stretched into the rest of my existence. It was then that I decided I needed to make a change. I thought about my passions, my goals, and all of the little characteristics that make me the person that I am, and I realized that I didn’t want to follow a certain path to get me to an end result. I wanted to live. I wanted to experience life to the fullest.
It was that mindset that drove me to the “all powerful” Google to search for flight attendant jobs. I had always been fascinated with the fast pace lifestyle, and it seemed to fit my adventurous spirit to a T. I found one right off the bat and immediately started the application process. It has been almost a year since I first applied to that small charter airline and it has been one heck of a journey! I applied and applied again to many different airlines, went to multiple interviews, and received an abundance of “thanks… but no thanks” emails in my inbox. I was just about ready to fall back into my 9-5, marry a man, and make babies plan when I got an unexpected email from a sister airline to one of the ones that I had applied for. I opened the email and had an unexpected zinnng in my stomach — MAGIC. I had another chance, and it was a highly successful airline!
A week later, I was navigating my way to the airport at 4:00AM (NO people… this girl is not much of a morning person, but I was willing to sacrifice for my chance to be a Pan Am wannabe), in the middle of one of the biggest snowstorms that Kentucky has seen. I was trudging through the snow in my black high heals and hosiery, praying that my flight would take off. Six hours and one tiny plane later, I was at headquarters, aimed and ready to start the four-hour interview process. Five more hours later, I was being ushered into a room with five other women. We were all tired, but we didn’t show it. We had our “flight attendant” grins on and were just waiting with butterflies in our stomachs for what was coming next. We had been there longer than anticipated, but we didn’t know whether to be hopeful just yet.
There had been around thirty people who had interviewed with us and over the course of the day they had each gone home. The room had gone completely silent, until the silence was broken by the sultry voice of Frank Sinatra singing, “Come fly with me, let’s fly, let’s fly away!” All the airline interviewers in the room began to clap and someone shouted, “You got it girls!! The world is your oyster!” I have never experienced a more magical moment in my entire life. It was like all of my dreams were suddenly in reach! Real magic has nothing to do with fairies, or fairy tales. I believe magic is found in every small and large personal victory. It’s found in every new beginning, and it’s just out there for the taking. I spent twelve months looking for a job, and I honestly have enough rejection letters to wallpaper a small apartment, but I ended up “landing” my dream job, and THAT was worth the wait. I hope you will join me on my journey to becoming a flight attendant J. Please fasten your seat belts in case of turbulence!! I still have a long way to go, but I’ve got “magic” on my side ;).
xoxo
Megan Marie
