Why didn’t I write it down?

Winter is far from over and snow can occur into May, however the prolonged deep freeze is lifting with temperatures moderating significantly.

The snow that fell on Tuesday was therefore wet and heavy as opposed to the light fluffy texture we get with frigid cold which is much easier to deal with.

It will take some time for the snow cover to disappear and when the melt sets in it begins to look very drab, however I have a backlog of photos to get through and before I get to those…

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I thought I would return to another favourite subject.

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The sky, which at dawn on Christmas Eve was stormy.

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Though it soon cheered up.

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When we went out not long after, patches of overnight snow were beautifully lit up.

My memory is not that phenomenal, but the photographs indicate we went to Greenwich.

My father kept a diary that he religiously updated every day. Long ago, in my boarding school days I kept one too but it was more like boring school and I got tired of writing the same thing, so the following year I gave it up.

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When exciting or unusual events occur, you assume you will remember them but over time the details become blurred. Then, if you compare notes with someone who shared the experience, often you will find that they recall it differently.

In the course of 38 years working for a large international airline, one tends to acquire a collection of memories of varying sorts. How I wish I’d written them down.

One night I remember, I left the terminal in gales of laughter over something that had occurred during the shift, but I have never been able to recall the event, only the belly laugh I shared with a colleague. Perhaps sharing a laugh is all that matters.

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Customer service is taxing and draining and often very stressful. It was one of the worst choices I could have made for myself since I abhor unpleasantness, raised voices and chaos which an airport offers in abundance at just about any time of day.

Whatever was I thinking?

That is easy to answer, though nothing to be proud of. I had graduated with a degree in anthropology which was basically useless since I could not afford to pursue it further. Immediately after graduation, I had college loans to begin repaying.

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After leaving high school, I worked the summer as a supermarket check-out clerk, earning $1.25 per hour, which was then the minimum wage. Before starting college I took a position in a factory that paid $1.50ph to assemble printed circuit boards which I learned on the job, but before long the night shift got laid off and I had to look elsewhere.

This turned out to be a blessing when I found similar employment for $2 an hour! Furthermore, I was permitted to work hours that fitted with my classes. This saw me occasionally working alone in the factory at night which made me slightly nervous, for good reason, but luckily I managed to avoid complications.

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$2 an hour, however, was not going to pay back college loans and assembly work was not something I envisioned as a career choice. But those three jobs were the sum total of my experience. Who on earth would employ me?

The only other thing I knew a little bit about was travel and my aunt had worked long ago for BOAC so I knew that airline employment awarded you travel benefits. Family members lived in different parts of the globe, so if I wished to visit them, this was a serious consideration.

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That is all there was to it. No skill was required. In those pre-computer days you got trained on the job and sent to a classroom only if you passed probation. All I had to do was pass an interview and as luck would have it that year BOAC began service to Los Angeles which saw many JFK staff transferring and needing to be replaced.

Starting salary as I recall was something like $3 per hour.

Checking in and otherwise assisting airline passengers is somewhat more involved than ringing up groceries, but it wasn’t long before the novelty of being in an airport wore off. It had always been exciting years ago, when I was going somewhere. Working there, oh it could be exciting, but I very much preferred when it was not.

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For a while I entertained the idea of graduate school, but after commuting a couple of times to take classes at NYU, I gave it up because I had no real focus and it was all too stressful.

After a year, I got my travel benefits and my employment also offered health insurance and a pension plan. By the time I was really fed-up with it, I had too much invested in the job.

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As much as I sometimes seriously disliked what I did for a living, I had to acknowledge that it afforded me many opportunities I would not otherwise have had, experiences I would never have been able to enjoy.

And for all the frustration and exasperation, there was an equal amount of fun and laughter. We were a very mixed group of people who for the most part got on well together, especially in bad moments when it really counted.

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But I do wish I’d written it all down.

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