Things not to do
Instructors- Posting on a forum about your students weaknesses and asking for help makes you a good instructor. Posting them as comedy, especially on a board where the student also posts, makes you an ass. Think about which type of instructor you want to be.
New hires- Embellishing on your previous experience is not recommended. Someone will know more than you, ask you questions you can’t answer and you will eventually be found out. A was telling me stories of experiences that changed from “I used to fly a XXX” to “no, I didn’t really fly one” and “I used to fly for XXX” to “Well, I was hired but didn’t make it though training”. Aviation is a small world and someone, somewhere will remember that you got caught in a lie.
Someday- don’t trust A’s time tracking skills. A “quick” stop at a restaurant for breakfast before the flight to Houston led to us getting stuck in weather related traffic, which led to him missing his flight back (he was there 30 minutes prior but the flight was weight restricted for weather and they couldn’t get him on) and left him sitting at the terminal for nearly 7 hours while flight after flight went out weight restricted and without him. And he was traveling positive space.
This was a tough weekend- midnight arrival on friday night, bickering during errand running all day on saturday, sunday’s flight disaster. Plus still coming to terms with last weekends news. But we had some good times too.
Waits and balances
A called last night to tell me that he was going to be able to come home this weekend after all. Said he needed to “get a haircut and pick up a shirt and tie for his checkride”. We both know it’s really because he misses me and really wants a home cooked meal. And someone to do his laundry. I’ll forgive him is inability to vocalize his emotions, he’s a man and he’s not used to it. If he’s flying positive space and on the company tab, I will welcome him home with open arms. Even if it means having to be at the airport at 11:20pm on friday night and back again at 8:30am sunday.
Actually, I was more ambivilent that he was about his coming home for the weekend. I had made lots of plans with friends to keep us occupied for the weekend and him coming home means having to make a choice. Do I keep the plans with them and let him fend for himself, risking that he might not be home again for a few weeks? Or do I cancel and spend time with him, potentially missing out on fun stuff with them? I’m working on coming to a balance with both.
I think (and I can say this b/c he has freely admited that he doesn’t even know where my blog is at, let alone how to read it) that he is having a having a harder time with the separation than I am. He was a confirmed bachelor when we met, but has become accustomed to partnered life and being cared for. On the other hand, life hasn’t changed so much for me, except that now I have to go back to being the one to kill the half dead lizards that cat brings us. My routine hasn’t changed nearly as much in the past few years as his has.
The next big decision to tackle is what base to “request” (as if the airline will actually consider it when they assign him somewhere…) and how we will deal with that. There are pros and cons to each of the possible decisions. If only I had a crystal ball.
Our other situation is progressing as well as can be expected. Now that the initial shock has worn off, we are just waiting for the end of the journey. I suspect that that is part of the reason he is coming home too, to help deal more with the issues at hand. But it’s difficult to get a straight answer on the phone about those kinds of things. Hopefully news in the upcoming weeks will be positive and we can move past this. Fingers are crossed.
The good and the bad
A’s in his second week of training. We made it through week one no problem. I managed things at home just fine, as I knew I would and he managed to score well on his indoc test. Next two weeks are CRM and systems. He came home for a short time this weekend past (11pm friday-2pm sunday), but won’t be coming home again until systems is done. Then, another short weekend and back for sim time. I figure if we can get by with him being gone for 1-2 weeks at a time, then going the 4-5 days required when he’s flying regularly won’t be an issue.
Reintegrating him into our lives was not so difficult, but was reminiscent of summers past when I worked away from home and had limited time back on occasional weekends. He came home from training with a few tasks he wanted/needed to accomplish. But he also wanted to spend time with us. And there was limited time for it to all come together. It can be hard to reconcile all that needs to be done with what is wanted to be done. I learned this the hard way many summers ago and was careful not to push it. Careful planning, scheduling and remembering that he had an agenda of his own and wasn’t solely available to pay attention to us for the weekend helped. I think it’s a valuable lesson to learn.
We had the most difficult personal crisis of our relationship come up this weekend. I won’t go in depth about it here, but it involved making painful, life changing decisions. It is incredibly hard to have to push though this alone, knowing that A wants to be here more than anything, but can’t be and also doing my best to keep the goings on a secret from my son. Thank god I have several friends who have stepped up an offered support and compassion. Knowing that makes A feel slightly better as well too, I think. I can only thank my stars that A WAS here this weekend to help me through the first stage. The physical will be resolved in another 3.5 weeks, but the emotional will take longer. It would be easier to handle if he were able to come home again in a few days, once his trip was complete, but that’s not the stage we are at yet. And even in this difficult cloud, we were able to see the silver lining.
My husband wears a clip-on tie to work
Every day. This is just about the unsexiest thing I can think of. My fantasy is ruined. Nothing says dork like a clip-on tie. Really, how lazy do you have to be to not want to bother tying a tie every day. Envision a man, in the heat of passion, yanking off his clip-on tie and tossing it across the room. Yep, that just ruins it right there. Not to mention all the sexy things a girl can do with a real tie. A lot less options there with the clip on… On second thought, maybe those suspender things that clip a shirt to the socks to keep it tucked in (military men wear them) are slightly less sexy. But only slightly.
He tried to play it off as a safety issue. As in “A terrorist won’t be able to choke me with it if I’m wearing a clip on.” So I gave him 1/2 a point for that, but still… How can this be the same man who gets a haircut every two weeks so he doesn’t look scruffy?
 Found this discussion on a forum site. MMM, nice. Do your wives know how you feel about them? Or are you just showing off how “manly” you are? Is that how you would want someone to speak about your daughter? Gotta love male bravado.