# When Dreams Take Flight



## David Baxter PhD (Nov 25, 2009)

When Dreams Take Flight 
By ELIZABETH FULLER, _New York Times_
November 24, 2009 

IN my 20s I was a flight attendant for Northwest Airlines, and I remember the holiday season as the most exhausting of the year. But I loved my job. From the first day Northwest hired me in Minneapolis in 1969, I tried to be a model flight attendant, to develop the qualities my operations manual demanded: poise, good judgment, initiative, adaptability and a spotless appearance. 

But one time I slipped up: I fell asleep. It happened one dreary morning around Thanksgiving. We?d just landed in Washington and I was dog-tired. The crew had disembarked for breakfast; the new passengers wouldn?t board for two hours. For some reason, my eye drifted toward the overhead racks. Back then, the racks in Boeing 727?s had no doors and were used only for storing pillows, blankets and passengers? coats and hats. I looked at all the little pillows up there, snuggled next to the blankets. And then I climbed up. 

This was not easy in a pencil skirt and regulation red half-slip. But I did it. And it was heaven. I lay back on the mountain of pillows and pulled a blanket up over my head. Just before I drifted off, the thought crossed my mind that I ought to set my portable alarm clock ? but it was too late. 

I certainly wasn?t worrying about our operations manual, though I knew, of course, that flight attendants caught sleeping on duty could lose their wings. But I wasn?t on duty, not in the strict sense. What?s more, I was exhibiting initiative and adaptability, some of those attributes most cherished by Northwest Airlines. 

It was a sound sleep. Suddenly I woke to a voice on the public address system: ?Morning, folks. This is your captain speaking. We?re No. 4 for takeoff, up near the end of the runway. So if you?ll just sit back and relax, we?ll be taking off in a few minutes. The flight attendants will do the best they can for you this morning, even though they are one short in the second cabin.?

I opened my eyes and gasped. The passengers and crew had boarded, and no one had checked my overhead bunk. If only someone had tried to store a coat up there or grab a blanket! I should have been down on the cabin floor, on duty and with my one-inch grosgrain ribbon tying my hair in place, my gold logo centered on the front of my hat. Instead, I was up on that rack, breaking into a cold sweat.

If I ever needed that Northwest Airlines initiative, it was then. I poked my head out and down. The cabin was packed with businessmen reading the financial papers. I hitched up my skirt ? hemmed precisely one and three-quarter inches above the knee ? and lowered a leg. This snagged the attention of the last 10 rows, as well as my pantyhose. Then I lowered my other leg. By this time, the rows in front had turned around and were watching too. Luckily, no one laughed. 

I swung down and planted my navy blue pump half on a passenger?s arm rest and half on his pinstriped leg. My hat was in the overhead rack, I told him, and I had been digging around for a long time trying to find it. I pointed out that I had to wear my hat, or I would be fired.

He cleared his throat but didn?t say anything. I thanked him for his understanding and walked up the aisle toward my two fellow flight attendants, who were howling with laughter. We were sobered only by the realization that somebody had to notify the captain. 

As the plane rose to cruising altitude, the senior flight attendant went to the cockpit and explained that I was back in the cabin. Meanwhile, I put on my smock and began pouring coffee, trying to avoid the rows near my overhead bunk. As I headed back to the galley to refill my coffeepot, I found the captain waiting for me with a stern and unforgiving look. I was getting ready to try to explain when he snapped the galley curtain closed and doubled over with laughter. ?All?s well that ends well,? he said with a wink.

_Elizabeth Fuller is the author of the play *Me and Jezebel*._


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