OUR PRIMARY PURPOSE IS YOUR SAFETY
I�m working back from Newark to Atlanta. I don�t feel good. (Again) The flight attendant I�m working with is sick. Like Flu sick, but she�s afraid to call in sick because they�ve totally screwed our sick leave policy where pretty much you have to pay them if you are ever sick. So, I�m already sick and she�s coughing and hacking and now I�m feeling sicker. So I�m working first class which is starting to be the worst place to work now. See, people in coach, they come from a wide variety of places, incomes, races, etc. It�s almost like you�re all in the same boat and expectations are pretty low. But in first class now, it�s a lot of mid management people who get their ass chewed out often and have to travel 50 weeks out of the year. They�re not happy. They�re not happy because the boss, the wife, the kids, etc are all on their asses all the time. So when they get on the plane they want their asses kissed� by me. That�s where the problem begins. See I have very little respect for them, for many reason but one being, if they were truly that important they would charter a jet. I saw on the news a year or so ago how if you are buying a first class ticket from New York to Atlanta, you could pay 50 dollars more and charter a jet.
But here�s the rub, the people in first class, who like to remind me that they are �paying my salary� are not buying first class ticket. They�re buying coach tickets like everyone else but because they buy them 50 weeks out of the year my airline deems them important. Precious medals are what we call them. The funny thing is that we�re supposed to spend so much time kissing their asses when in all reality there is a 99% chance that there is someone in coach who has paid more for their ticket than the precious medal sitting in first class. So why should I, tired and sick make them feel important. Oh that�s right. It�s my stinking job.
I didn�t mean to go on such a rampage, forgive me. So I�m pouring the 3rd glass of red wine to the guy in 3-D who of course is too important and too involved playing solitaire on his computer to give me eye contact or say thank you, when the phone (Cabin intercom) rings. I answer the phone and it�s the flight attendant in the back who tells me that a man has collapsed in coach and she needs help. Ok I shouldn�t say that I was excited because I wasn�t really. I was actually pretty nervous but there was a part of me that felt like, OK I�m going to do what I�m trained to do. I am there primarily for your safety and I'm about to show you how. You�re going to see it now.
I tell coughing girl what�s going on and I go to coach where there�s this mid 40 year old man sprawled out on the floor surrounded by curious passenger. On my particular airline we have a saying of �you find em�, you cure em� so even though I was the flight attendant in charge I pretty much take her directions because by the time I got there she should have done the basic ABC�s of airway, breathing, circulations. Which she had. All is there but the guy is out like a light. So I get the medical kit and the defibulator just in case and I make the P.A. asking if there is a doctor, nurse, etc on board. There isn�t so it�s me and this girl. The coughing girl comes up to help and I tell her to tell the cockpit what is going on. Now pretty much it�s a three way team. I follow the first girl, I report to the coughing girl and she reports to cockpit. It�s actually a little more complicated than that but you probably don�t care and I don�t feel like getting into it that much. Ok so we�re doing all of this stuff. The guy starts to come to. I then hear this chiming. I�d heard it before but I must have tuned it out. It�s a call light, from first class. I ignore it but then it rings again. Then I think; what if someone else is sick. I run up to first class and it�s 3-D. I�m thinking. He�s a doctor. Sometimes doctors are a little hesitant to identify themselves, especially if they�ve been drinking because of the legal issues but pretty much there�s the whole Good Samaritan thing so they can�t be sued. So I run up to him and see what he wants. Waiting for him to tell me that he�s here to help. But what was I thinking. He wanted another glass of wine.
I told him that I was dealing with a sick passenger and he looked at me and asked if it required all of us to do it. The man next to him laughed. At him I�m hoping. I sternly said yes and that in fact there probably wouldn�t be anything else served because we we�re probably going to have to divert to Charleston. I made that up. But I just wanted to mess with him. I turned and walked away and dealt with the sick guy whose problem ended up being that he hadn�t eaten or drunken anything for about 14 hours because he was in an important meeting. So thank God he was ok. Since I was the flight attendant in charge I had to get all this information and report it back to the company. While I�m doing this what do I hear again? The call light. I look up and I see all the way up the cabin. It�s in first class. I snapped. I heard the coughing flight attendant tell me that she�d get it but it was too late I was half way up the aisle. I got to 3-D and I slam the button off. He finally looks up. I then had to go to my angry black man stare and demand what he wanted. He said that he still wanted a glass of wine. I told him in a very deliberate and low voice which for some reason scares people more than if you yell or scream that he was not getting more wine. Because we were busy dealing with a sick passenger and he said that it wasn�t his problem and I said, that tonight it was.
Now after it was all said and done there was probably about another 45 minutes left to go on the flight. The sick man was sleep. The coughing girl was still coughing and I went back to first class to serve them. Everyone else by that point had either gone to sleep or heard my conversation to 3-D because they were so concerned about the sick guy while they ask for their refill. 3-D said he didn�t want anything accept for my name. Which I gave him. I�ve never received a bad letter in my 14 years at this airline so I figure it�s about time for one.
The part that gets me is that there�s a good chance that if he writes a letter, my airline will reward him by giving him a free upgrade or extra frequent flyer miles instead of telling him that he�s a jerk and if he was the one who�d passed on tube going 540 mile per hour, 33 thousand feet in the air with no one to help but little old server me, I bet he�d be pretty peeved if he didn�t get his medical attention because I had to continue to do my primary job which is to serve and make the passengers feel like they are so important to me. Did I mention that I hate my job? But I feel so better getting it out.
My Weather
