I’m asked often and in varied ways how and why I became a flight attendant.

 “How did you get into the airlines?”

“What made you decide to do this?”

“Did you always want to be a flight attendant?”

I decided to answer these questions. To let you know a little more about myself, what I did before, and how it is I ended up here—a full-time flight attendant.

The short answer to the question of how I became a flight attendant is “It fell into my lap.” But the way it happened felt a little like it was meant to be. A twist of fate, divine coincidence, or just another surprise turn on life’s road. Whatever you want to call it, I love this story. And retelling it reminds me to be grateful for ending up here, right where I belong. Somewhere I never knew I wanted to be.

So here goes, my flight attendant origin story. Buckle up, we’re going back in time.

My Flight Attendant Origin Story

How I became a Full-Time Flight Attendant

2013

North of Boston, Massachusetts

I needed change.

I had been bartending—at the bar I planned to work in for the summer after college while I figured out the next step—for five years. It was a lot of fun, but I felt like I had stayed way too long. Like I’d been to the bar and the afterparty and now the birds were chirping, sunrise reminders of my still being there. I felt stuck. Like I was wasting something in myself.

It was this sticky, wasted feeling that made me long for something new. A new job, a new city. A new adventure. I was uncertain about what to do next, but the need for change propelled me. Even without a destination, some forward movement was better than none.

I decided I would go before I had a place to go. I began applying for jobs in marketing and writing and web admin around the country—Oregon, Chicago, Seattle. I didn’t care where I ended up and I didn’t care much what I’d be doing. I just felt the deep need to move. I set a cutoff date and gave my two months’ notice at the bar. If I didn’t have a job by then, I’d pack up my things and move to Portland, Oregon, where my brother lived.

Great, we had a plan(ish). And a backup plan(ish).

That two-month cutoff date came before a job offer did. It was mid-September. I said my final goodbyes to the coworkers and regulars I’d been working alongside and serving for years. There had been so many good people. On my last night of work, I received cards and gifts and kind words—not just from my favorites, but also from unexpected sources. It was a sweet, but not sad goodbye. A cup-filling, wing-lifting sendoff.

The next day I packed my suitcase and flew to Ireland to spend ten days with a friend who was living there. While in the emerald country, I took day trips to Northern Ireland and to the Cliffs of Moher in the West. We did a weekend road trip around the Ring of Kerry, stayed in Killarney and Kinsale. I laughed and drank Guiness and did a lot of walking on cobblestone streets. It was the perfect segue. A pause between my old life and the new one I was about to start. But I had no idea just how wild and different that new life would look.

The plan after Ireland was to spend the week at home with family and my then girlfriend, making the most of my time with loved ones before we began new, long-distance relationships. I was moving to Portland. The furthest I could go from Boston and still be in the U.S. My mom requested a week off from work to drive cross country with me, and I walked around with a constant pit in my stomach composed of equal parts excitement and anxiety. I had a plan.

But when the time came to execute that “plan”, when I’d returned from abroad, refreshed and invigorated—a paved road to a glowing blank slate of opportunity before me—I found an unexpected surprise. An email that would change the whole shaky thing.

Earlier in 2013

I bartended on Wednesday afternoons. A bowling league would come in each week like clockwork, and while I was shaky on the names, I knew what each of them drank and had it ready before they asked. We even opened the bar early for them so they could drink before they bowled. This is how I met Diana. She worked for an airline, in ground operations, lifting bags and towing planes. And on Wednesdays she came in to bowl with her dad and all his bowling buddies.

We began our acquaintanceship first over pineapple margaritas, and then with travel talks across the bar. She worked in travel, I adored travel. We talked of weekends away and trips to be taken. Comparing notes and tan lines. Destination brainstorms—things to do and what to eat there. In my life today, travel is one of the best bond builders I can think of. In my life then, it was more novel. And I looked forward to our Wednesday travel chats.

Then one day, on a Tuesday afternoon out of the blue, she messaged me over Facebook.

“My airline is hiring flight attendants. The application is open tonight from 7-9 if you want to apply.”

You read that correctly. Flight attendant hiring was so competitive at that time that they literally only opened their application window for two hours. I would find out later that thousands of people had applied in those same two hours.

I had never thought about becoming a flight attendant. Had never given flight attendants any thought at all. They were a part of the background noise in my travels. (In fact, you can check out the post “7 Things I wish I knew Before Becoming a Flight Attendant” to read all about the misconceptions I held and others hold.)

But what I had thought about, many times, was incorporating travel more prominently in my life. Weaving it into the fabric of my day-to-day rather than having one-off adventures once a year.

I had started my Peace Corps application—twice—and left it unfinished both times. I had signed up for an au pair service online that matched families and nannies around the world. I had explored sites like coolworks.com and looked at opportunities working in national parks or on organic farms around the world. I’d even thought about working on cruise ships. I had been looking into schemes for free travel, ways to integrate exploration, and a lifestyle that looked different than office by day and TV at night. I’d been on the hunt for this thing for years. Yet somehow, I had never thought of this very obvious path: I could work for an airline.