My career course was set long before High School graduation as my Dad got me hooked on flying in his little Cessna 150  before I was 16.  With that goal in mind, I simultaneously built my required "experience" hours in the cockpit by teaching flying and getting my BS at Cal State Hayward.

As it turned out, other career choices might have been an easier "row to hoe" as my Grandma would have said.   I graduated from private aviation, to piloting propeller 50-passenger planes to and from  6 Western States and 36 cities, most of them in California. I had three separate commuter airlines go belly-up in the aftermath of Federal deregulation of airlines, moved 11 times in a 3 year period and had a promising career going with the FAA's accident investigation unit with Air Traffic Control, but knew I couldn't be happy unless I could get back in the air.

Looking back at interview scenarios I encountered in those times, makes me laugh.  American Airlines wouldn't hire me because I wasn't 5'11".  United wouldn't hire me because I admitted to wanting a family in the future.  People's Express was suspicious of the California girl politics and being distinctly not an "East Coaster".  After several setbacks,  luck arrived when XXXXXXXXXX offered me a job.

I've been with XXXXXXXXXX 24 years now and am Captain on the biggest plane they own.  Fewer than 1% of women pilots are qualified for the position of Captain on the MD-11. Each rung up the ladder of "heavy" aircraft has been wonderful.  Each and every time, I have grown to love flying the current plane so much, I'm always torn when looking at the choice of leaving it.  Then it always turns out I love the new one just as much.   And I'm not done yet.  XXXXXXXXXXX is expecting delivery on an even more advanced Boeing 777, and I'll be bidding the Captain seat on that as soon as it is delivered.  I do recall a certain Chemistry teacher at ECHS that told me I would never make it.

With all the joy that flying has brought me, it also brought some pain.  It was only after I'd lost two babies, that studies confirmed long hours at altitude can adversely affected women's reproductive abilities.  My husband who was also a pilot,  was killed in a crash of our vintage navy plane 10 years ago.

My Mom still lives in the Kensington house where I grew up.  I often tire of the international flying scene and then arrange my duty schedule to fly in to Oakland as often as possible, so I can keep in touch.  I never grow tired of coming in for the approach over the bay area lights, often right over my Mom's house, especially at night when all the Bay Area lights seem to be welcoming me home.

 

It has been an interesting road....