A Lubbock, Texas overnight might not be high on everybody’s list, but for me it always provides a chance to catch up with my niece, a Texas Tech grad, now the mother of three active boys, and married to a Lubbock firefighter.
We finished our dinner together and Lindsay said, “I better get you back to the hotel. We’re expecting a big dust storm later tonight.” With a hug goodbye, I headed up to the 6th (top) floor of the downtown Elegante Hotel and got ready for bed, knowing I’d get up at 0500 for the first flight to Dallas Love Field.
The Dust Storm Arrived
As predicted, late in the night I woke up to howling winds buffeting the hotel windows. I got out of bed and pulled back the curtains to see an obstructed, hazy view of the street below. The street lights cast an eerie yellow-brown glow, as though trying to see underwater in a pool full of ice tea.
The dust storm was so thick that I couldn’t make out the buildings across the street. I was standing in a dust cloud of Texas dirt, listening to the angry wind trying to break into my hotel room from the outside.
I backed away, closing the curtain and only then was aware of the complete silence surrounding me and looked around the room to realize that the clock and air conditioning were off. Hmmm. The hotel had lost power. Heading back to bed, I reset my alarm for another 15 minutes earlier, thinking it might be hard getting ready to leave in a dark room.
O’ Dark Thirty Wake Up
At 0445, my alarm went off and, using my cell phone flashlight, I headed to the bathroom for a quick shower and shave. After getting dressed, I thought I’d head down early to see if the flight attendants needed help carrying their luggage down the six flights of stairs.
Carrying my suitcase and flight bag, I entered the darkened lobby, dimly lit by only two emergency lights behind the hotel desk clerk. From a dark corner I heard the laughing and cackling of three Dallas-based flight attendants sitting in a dark corner. These 40-year veterans of our airline were affectionately referred to as “senior mamas”, some of the original “stewardesses” of our 1970’s airline.
“Do y’all need help with your luggage?” I asked.
“Oh no, Darlin’, we got our things down here just fine,” one replied.
I told them, “It’s so dark in here I can’t hardly see y’all.”
The ringleader laughed, “Honey, you don’t wanna see me. I ain’t got my makeup on!” And the others laughed in agreement.
“Is the Captain down here yet?” I asked, not sure if he had made the trip down or was in another dark corner.
“Oh yes. He’s across the street getting some coffee,” a Dallas senior mama told me.
In a strange twist, our block had the power outage, but the Quick Track convenience store across the street had their lights on. Right at that moment, our captain, Bryan Knight, walked through the front door with two trays of six cups of coffee.
Not only was he taking care of his crew of five, but Bryan handed one to the frazzled young lady behind the desk.
No sooner had the clerk thanked him for the appreciated early morning coffee, when the stairwell door opened and two pilots in dark blazers walked toward the desk, empty-handed. Tossing his keys on the hotel desk, the pilot demanded, “Y’all need to send someone up to get our bags.”
Read more from David Dale:
Well Good Morning to you!
I was struck by the different attitudes of two groups of airline employees in the same predicament. One crew is laughing and sharing coffee together, wondering how we can help each other.
The other is demanding service from a lone hotel employee, standing helplessly in the glow of emergency lights. I knew I had come to the right airline.
It’s All About The Attitude
A mantra I heard early in my tenure is that anyone, pilot or flight attendant, can do our job, but during our interview process, our airline strove to Hire for Attitude and Train for Aptitude. It makes all the difference!
