THE PROPOSAL (#7): I joined Continental Airlines in early 2000, at age 50, as a part-time Reservation Agent for the health insurance and the free travel. I had a goal of traveling to every country in the world, but only made it to 29, because airline consolidation after 9/11 made it much more difficult to travel, especially for a newer employee with low seniority. Prior to this trip with Cathy I had gone to Prague, Bali, Ecuador, Alaska (for 24 hours), and the last trip which included France, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Zambia, and Mozambique. I had always traveled alone.
A Continental employee and their spouse or designated travel companion can travel First Class on a Continental flight or in coach on other airlines, if space is available, based on seniority. An employee can take a friend along on a Buddy Pass, but that person always flies coach. Employees can change their designated travel companion once a year, in November.
I had designated a girlfriend from high school who I had started seeing again as my first travel companion, but she didn’t like the hours (midnight to 4:00 a.m., with Mondays and Tuesdays off), saw no future in the part-time job, and dumped me before we could take our planned trip to Prague.
Next, I had a relationship with a woman I had also met on Match.com, and she was still my designated travel companion when I met Cathy. This woman also dumped me (I was on a bad steak) before we could travel. She lived in Lakeland, over an hour away from my home in St. Pete Beach. Even though I had figured out how to work with a friend and pull three 8 hour shifts one week, and two the next, she also didn’t understand why an attorney and real estate broker was working part-time for $7.50 an hour.
Then I met Cathy and she got me, in more ways than one. She was excited about the chance to travel.
As we were leaving the Continental hub in Newark for Milan, I had a chance to talk with the gate agent, an employee like me. I explained that I had been an employee for nearly 2 years and had always traveled alone; that designating a travel companion seemed to be a jinx. Now that I had someone to travel with, I couldn’t designate her for another month; and this was a special person, an artist I was taking to Florence. She understood and upgraded Cathy to First Class because there were several open seats.
So, we were off on our adventure, flying First Class with glasses of champagne! Unfortunately, things weren’t so easy on the return flight home. The gate agents in Milan were contract employee and had to go strictly by the rules. So we boarded, Cathy in coach and me in First Class.
The First Class concierge came to say hello and ask if I wanted a glass of Champagne. I asked if there was any way he could get one to my fiancé in couch. There was an empty seat next to me, so I explained my sad story again, only this time Cathy was my fiancé. As I hoped, he said, “I can do better than that.” A few minutes later he came back with Cathy and said, “We’ve had a request to change your seat Miss.”
As we were toasting with glasses of champagne, Cathy asked, “How did you do that?” “The same way I did it in Newark, but I added you were my fiancé.” Cathy replied, “So you lied to that nice man?”
I thought for a minute and said, “It doesn’t need to be a lie. Will you marry me?” Cathy’s answer was “You can’t be serious.” I replied, “I am serious. Do you want me to get on my knee?” Cathy said, “You can’t. The seat belt sign is on!”
Coming tomorrow: HOME TO COLORADO TO MEET THE PARENTS
