A Thankful Award

On August 30th, I will begin a sixteen day vacation to Australia. I have been dreaming of this vacation for almost seven years now. One of the most important and influential people in my life lives there, and I cannot wait to get to spend time with him and his wife - in Australia.

At my airline, I was eligible for two weeks of vacation this year. Our vacations were bid in October of 2007 for all of 2008. Vacation is awarded in seven day blocks, Monday through Friday, based on seniority order. (The flight attendant who has been here the longest and bids on Week A, gets it first. Each week is assigned a certain number of flight attendants who may be on vacation at that time.) I tried to balance my vacation choice with a week where I felt I stood a good chance of being awarded the vacation and also when the airfare to Australia would be cheaper (ie: an offpeak time).

I was awarded the first two weeks of September, September 1st through the 14th. I was so excited to be going to Australia! I had been saving money all summer and fall last year to buy my plane tickets. On New Years Day, I finally bought them. It turned out to be about 500 dollars cheaper if I bought my tickets for August 30th than if I bought them for September 1st. I took a leap of faith and bought them for the earlier date.

I knew I would need to get additional time off from work. And have been worried ever since about the logistics of doing so. We have something called Vacation Day At A Time at my airline - which is equivalent to a personal day. You accrue so many hours of VacDat time per month, based on how long you've been with the company. It is supposed to be awarded first-come, first-serve. I emailed our Crew Planning department at the end of May asking for three VacDat days, August 29th, 30th, and 31st.

This morning, Crew Planning replied and informed me I was awarded VacDat for the 29th, 30th and 31st! I am so excited. Thats one battle won. Now I need to figure out if I have enough vacation time to take the day after I return from Australia off. I'll put that right back into God's hands where my prayers for the August days rested.

Thank you, God! I'm so excited. My vacation is almost here ... I'm really going to Australia!