Highest Duty_ My Search for What Really Matters - Chesley B. Sullenberger [7]
I didn’t kiss Lorrie because, over the years, I’ve come to realize that Lorrie is a light sleeper, and though I’d like to quietly kiss her before every trip and whisper “I love you,” doing so at 5:30 A.M. wouldn’t be fair to her. I’d leave, and she’d be left there in bed, eyes open, to contemplate everything that she and our two daughters needed to do in the days ahead—all of it without me or my help.
Despite my passion for flying, the constant departures that define a pilot’s life have been very hard on us. Gone from home about eighteen days per month, I have missed well over half of my children’s lives.
My leaving isn’t an indication that I love flying more than I love my wife and kids. In fact, Lorrie and I have talked in recent years about my doing something besides commercial aviation, something that would keep me closer to home. Despite the limits on how a man can reinvent himself, I’ve been confident about finding another way of meeting my family’s financial needs that would equal being an airline captain. But I’ve wanted it to be a good fit that would take advantage of my life experiences. In the meantime, my dedication to the profession remains strong. And Lorrie knows me. She knows what flying means to me. We’ve found our ways to cope.
And so on that Monday, like so many before, I took my leave. Lorrie and our daughters, Kate, sixteen, and Kelly, fourteen, were fast asleep when I pulled the car out of our garage in Danville, California, and headed for San Francisco International Airport.
As the sun rose, I was already thirty-five miles away, crossing over San Francisco Bay on the San Mateo Bridge. I needed to be on a 7:30 A.M. flight to Charlotte—as a passenger.
Flight crews all have a base of operation, and mine is Charlotte, North Carolina. I used to be based in San Francisco, beginning in the early 1980s, when I flew for Pacific Southwest Airlines. In 1988, PSA merged with USAir, and I became a USAir pilot. In 1995, when USAir closed its San Francisco base, my base became Pittsburgh and then Charlotte. Lorrie and I wanted to remain in California, so like others based far from home, I’ve made a decision to commute across the country to start my work. We have chosen this life, and I’m grateful the airline allows it. Still, the logistics of it are wearying.
I don’t have to pay for my flights to get to work, but I do have to go standby. If no seat is available, I can usually ride in the jumpseat in the cockpit. That’s my ace in the hole. Mostly, though, I prefer to be in the back of the plane, out of the way of the pilots doing their job. In the back, I can read a book or close my eyes and try to sleep.
Because I’m in uniform, passengers will sometimes ask me a question about the flight, the turbulence, or how to best jam their overstuffed bags into the overhead compartment. Just as often, no one really notices me.
That’s how it was on the flight that day to Charlotte. I sat there in my middle seat in coach, as anonymous as always, with no conception that by week’s end everything would change. These were the final days of my old familiar life as a pilot.
I AM a man of routine, and there’s a precision to my life that leaves Lorrie rolling her eyes sometimes. She says I’m very controlled and regimented, and though she believes that is part of what makes me a good pilot, it also makes me hard to live with on occasion. Lorrie knows other pilots’ spouses who describe them the same way. Like me, they’ll come home after days away and try to take charge, annoying loved ones by reorganizing the dishes in the dishwasher, finding a more efficient way to stack everything. I guess the flying culture—all our training—is what makes us so organized. Or, as Lorrie suspects, maybe there’s a certain type of personality attracted to the profession. In any case, I suppose I’m guilty as charged. But my exacting