Marry me and Fly for Free

This is where my story begins, on my wedding day, July 18th, 2009. The day I officially became a Magee. For the past 28 years of my life I was an Allen. It's a pretty awesome last name to have...you're at the start of the alphabet so I always got to sit in the first row in class which meant going first in oral presentations, getting tests firsts, having the best locker. It's also the last name I had when I started my job as a flight attendant. At the time I was living in Alabama where I was from and I had just gotten fired from my job as a copywriter. I needed rent money so of course I wasn't too picky when it came to finding my next job as long as it paid the bills. Scouring over the newspaper classified section I found an ad for an airline looking for flight attendants...and I thought, "why not this?" What really convinced me to take the job in the end was when my older brother told me, "if you become a flight attendant you'll get to travel all over the world and see things even people with the most money never see..."
Of course the flight benefits are why I decided to stay with the company after completing training so I packed my bags and moved to Colorado which is where I met my now husband.
They say you never really know someone until you travel with them and this is true. Since dating Chad and I have flown many flights together to Michigan (where he's from), Alabama, Florida, California, New York and our first big trip internationally together to Costa Rica. Not only do we have the stress of flying together but we are doing it on standby....yes we are traveling the world one open seat at a time. Standby means that you list for a flight and if there are seats open you get on...for free or a small mileage fee. Sometimes it's fabulous and sometimes you end up spending the night
in the airport. Before we were married Chad traveled on a buddy pass which basically meant he wasn't my equal in seniority status flying. So sometimes there would be a seat for one of us but not the other. True to everything we face in life, we never split up...we stay by each other until we can both get on. Half the time we don't even get to sit together but that's ok, we know we are both there heading to the same destination.
This is a blog that begins...not at the beginning of my traveling life, but the beginning of life as a traveling wife for me. I always said I'd do the job for 5 years and get out...but it's been 4 so far and I have no clue when this journey might end for me. I know it's not a career so I'm enjoying being a traveling wife as long as possible and the challenges it brings. I hope you find humor in this blog. It's not my first but hopefully it can be my main one from here on out....

here are a few pictures from our beautiful day that started it all: