The Thought Instigator
I have a rule for flight attendants. But first, I feel compelled to offer a definition of “flight attendant.”
The generic name came about as males joined females in the role of the stewardess – or, for the males, steward. (Interestingly, according to a variety of online sources, females replaced original male stewards early in commercial aviation – how things circle back!)
So, for the sake of simplicity, the use of the generic “flight attendant” replaced the gender-specific steward and stewardess. And also, in this day of gender identity awareness, the term “flight attendant” works for any person, regardless of gender association.
So, my definition of “flight attendant” is “one who attends to passengers on an airplane.” Simple, right? It’s almost a “duh” definition. Okay, it is a “duh” definition.
On my first flights of memory, in the ‘60s, we had stewardesses exclusively – I recall them offering pillows and passing out three-packs of L&Ms (to be consumed on the flight). They had requirements to hold their jobs, such as being trim and single and on the younger side of adult. They would actually be dismissed if they married and when they hit their mid-30s. That, of course, changed as we (read: commercial airline management, under the influence of increasingly intelligent consumers) matured. Now middle-aged women and fat guys and significantly othered others commonly attend to passengers.
I leave it to Wikipedia to explain further, as needed: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_attendant.
Nowadays all flight attendants are younger than I, and I’d bet most have a more desirable body mass index, regardless of gender. Don’t get me started on BMI – those calculators are clearly the products of pencil-thin geeks with nothing better to do than harass those of us who claim the system falls short.
See what your BMI is here (https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/educational/lose_wt/BMI/bmicalc.htm) and tell me you disagree.
And now for my rule for flight attendants.
My rule for flight attendants, regardless of stature, age or marital status, is this: They must enunciate. Yes, you heard it here. They must enunciate.
My dear wife, Leigh (who, FYI, aces her BMI, even after gaining a few vacation pounds), and I flew to Boston recently from Luis Muñoz Marín International Airport (AKA San Juan Airport) in Puerto Rico. We were returning home from a relaxing stay on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques – the principal of the so-called Spanish Virgin Islands (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Virgin_Islands).
After a low-altitude flight to San Juan (mostly around 500 feet over water, up to 1,000 feet over land, instead of the usual 2,000-2,500 feet; why, I don’t know, but I opted to not ask the pilot, who had volunteered that he was enjoying his temporary assignment in the Caribbean) on Cape Air’s work horse nine-passenger Cessna 402 (same as their Hyannis to Nantucket flights), we had a short wait for our flight to Boston. Settled into the Jet Blue Airbus A321 – possibly the same plane we flew down on – a young guy came on the audio system to do his safety routine.
He should have enunciated.
Now I get that plane safety directions are not at all likely to have to be followed, and I get that most passengers don’t pay any attention to them. But I do, no matter how many times I’ve heard the patter. I’m one of the minority of plane passengers who thinks what the flight attendant has to say is important. But I had no idea what he said. I could not understand the fellow. He spoke fast and unclearly. I found myself marveling that he was the choice of the flight attendant squad to communicate our instructions. Maybe they were simply confident the instructions would not have to be followed.
Now, let me note that I was not concerned for our safety. Air travel is incredibly safe. Far, far safer than automobile travel. I just wanted to understand our attendant. Oh well. It was a great flight. Now, where will we fly to next?