I am a former control freak. I did not roll well with sudden changes. I did not like surprises. Actually, I still don't like surprises. I am less of a control freak than I used to be but now I'd like to just call myself a "planner". I used to have a plan and if things did not go according to that plan I rarely handled it well. It has taken me years to evolve into someone who can simply go with the flow and I can think of a few moments in particular that have forced me to let go a little.
When we lived in Spokane and DH was first attending flight school he would regularly come home two-three hours late. Dinner had long gone cold and any date night plans were broken. I found myself getting upset with him on a regular basis over circumstances he couldn't control. Growing up I had one of those classic cat posters in my room that said, "If you can't change a situation, change how you feel about it." I woke up one morning thinking about that poster and realized that if I couldn't learn to let go over what time we had dinner at I would never survive this industry.
When we graduated college and moved home I thought we were home for good. We were saving up for a down payment on a house and I was constantly perusing listings and crunching numbers to see what we could afford. I was so excited to be planting roots. Then this flight instructing opportunity kind of fell into our laps. While it sucked emotionally, and the last thing that I wanted to do was move again, logically it just made sense and it was too good of an opportunity to say no to. It felt like a major step backward because it meant putting off buying a house indefinitely with no timeline for when we could come back. But looking back it was a huge step in the right direction for his career and we wouldn't be anywhere close to where we are today without that opportunity.
Finally, when DH started working for an airline my favorite perk of being a pilot's wife kicked in. The flight benefits. Depending on the agreements with certain airlines you either fly for free or for a small fee which is usually the cost of taxes. However, these flight benefits never guarantee you a seat on a certain flight, you fly standby. You are given a seat if they have any open and after they've already given seats to everyone in front of you on the standby list. So if the flight is full you have to wait for a flight that is open. I've heard of families being stranded in an airport for two days before getting a flight out. So far, we have gotten extremely lucky in that we've been able to play our cards right and, for the most part, get the flight we wanted. Sometimes we sat together and sometimes we didn't. We've had some very close calls where the flight was full and we almost didn't get on but at the last minute someone didn't show up. It can be very stressful and I am still learning how to let go and trust that we'll get to wherever we're going but it may not be right away. I am also still learning not to make plans in our destination based on getting on the first flight!
I'm still a little bit of a control freak. And I still always have a plan. But I also always have a plan B, C, D and E.
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