Red Lipstick, No Drama: Stories from a Flight Attendant

By Beth Ann Morrison

Red Lipstick, No Drama is a humorous look into the world of flight attendants—the role, responsibilities, lifestyle, and challenges. Based on anecdotes from a real-life flight attendant, these stories reveal the unpredictability of flying, from celebrity sightings to unruly customers, all in a day’s work. For those who have flight attendant experience, have worked in a customer-oriented industry or even those who think the job is merely a “waitress in the sky”, Red Lipstick, No Drama will be relatable, revealing, and laugh-out-loud funny.

About the Author
After parking her black roller bag and walking away from her life as a flight attendant, Beth Ann Morrison now leads a slower pace of life, running her own farm and herding her sheep with her husband in Iowa. She no longer wears red lipstick and both her husband and her sheep don't seem to mind. Beth Ann also now enjoys traveling, playing the organ, reading, taking golf lessons, and country dancing with her husband.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dorrance Publishing Company
• Release date: May 20, 2024
• ISBN: 9798892116237

Book preview

Present Day

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Rite of Passage

It wasn’t always this way. Years ago, flight attendants were respected, almost revered. After all, they are the folks trained to help you if you have a seizure, heart attack, lose consciousness, etc. And they have access to all the beer and snacks! That’s important! I must admit that the last item is what we spend most of our time doing. And that part of our job requires less paperwork and the least amount of initial training. It’s like a theatrical play. There is so much work done behind the scenes, and the audience only sees the cream on top.

There is so much more to my job than everyone knows. For instance, the training. It was brutal, and we didn’t get paid a dime! Now flight attendants in training DO get paid, but back then for me, it was quite a risk and a big chunk of my life away from my family. The entire process dominated our lives for five weeks straight, including housing and food. We had no control over any of our time. It was all regimented and regulated. The training department cut no slack—if you were late to class, even one time, even one second, the door was locked and you were told out in the hall to go gather your belongings, you are going home. I saw the need for such strictness later.

In the big scheme of things, out in the field, no one follows you around to make sure you are in the right place at the right time, carrying with you the correct required items.

Then there’s the FAA (Federal Aviation Administration). They are like a god. They can intimidate you, quiz you on the spot at any time about regulations and policies. I do see the need for that; some flight attendants don’t care as much as they should. They are just not as conscientious as I am. I admit, sometimes I try too hard. I grew up thinking I had to do everything perfectly, or else I failed.

Once, when I was a very new flight attendant, I failed to find a ringing phone call that was meant for me. It was on a late-night flight, yet still the flight was full, 143 passengers, and three flight attendants to maintain contentment and safety on the flight. We had already completed our drink service, including those stupid peanuts that I’m accused of being overpaid for passing out, as the public so often doesn’t understand that our job description includes handling and diffusing emergency situations—it’s not all just passing out peanuts. That’s only the tiniest part of our responsibilities.

I was passing through the cabin to collect trash, and the captain called us. He specifically asked for me. I immediately thought, What did I do wrong? The captain said that our scheduling department needed to reach me to give me a change in my work schedule, we call it a reroute. Back then, our passenger seats had compact phones in the backs of seats. The captain said he could patch scheduling through to the cabin, but he had no control over which of the seat back phones it would go to, so I should just listen for the ringing and find the one to answer.

It wasn’t long before I could hear a faint ringing. I started searching and listening, trying to find the ringing phone. The passengers were kind enough to try to help; some of them were saying, I think it’s coming from somewhere over here. After what seemed like several minutes, I noticed the flight attendant in the back was laughing. Wait! This was a specially choreographed joke, ON ME! Everyone was in on it, even some of the passengers. Luckily, I’m pretty good natured, so I laughed too. Everyone laughed; the flight attendant announced over the PA how the joke was set up, and that I was a new flight attendant. It was funny and memorable, and I still love the other two flight attendants to this day!

Believe me, I learned several jokes over the years that I could play on other new flight attendants! It’s a rite of passage. Maybe to make sure we don’t get too full of ourselves in our glamorous jobs! Once, when I was a seasoned flight attendant with several years under my belt, I had a new hire working with me. He was the sweetest man, young, single, quiet, reserved, kind, and seemed determined to do his best on the job. I was impressed with him, which is not always the case with new hires. I’m hard to impress. One of my faults, I admit, is to expect others to work as hard as I do. I’m frequently disappointed. But this guy, Terry, was obviously trying his hardest to do everything correctly.

I was flying up front, the A flight attendant, a position I have since abandoned as a senior flight attendant. It’s too hard to try to be perfect with all the extra responsibilities that go on all at once during boarding and deplaning. Now Terry was good natured, but I definitely caught him off guard that day! He was working in the C position, the middle of the cabin was his zone. I pulled aside a gentleman as he was boarding and asked him if he would be willing to help me play a joke on the new flight attendant. He enthusiastically agreed. I handed him an item out of my briefcase that is NOT a required FAA item, rubber fake vomit. I asked him to pretend during the flight that he didn’t feel well, and to ask Terry if he could bring him something for an upset stomach. He played it up even better than I could have hoped. He stopped Terry several times during the flight complaining of a stomach ache. He asked for medication, a vomit bag, etc. Then, while deplaning the gentleman told Terry on his way out that he was sorry for leaving a mess, but he did feel better. Terry looked like he’d seen a ghost! I told him it was his section, so he’d better glove up. He put double gloves on and looked at me with helpless puppy dog eyes. I said, Well, you may as well get it over with. He went to row eight where the gentleman had been sitting. There in the seat was the little barf bag, lying on its side, with the rubber vomit half in, and half out. Terry yelled, NO WAY, HE DIDN’T EVEN HIT THE BAG! It was all I could do to contain myself. He was about to pick up the bag before he realized it wasn’t even real. He laughed right along with the rest of us. I’m sure, if I’d run into him today, many years later, he would recall the incident just as clearly as I did of my own punk.

Last week, I flew with a young lady who was apparently raised to think the world revolved around her. You know the type—needs lots of attention, affirmation, really has no clue about teamwork or other people’s needs. She was definitely one of those who makes me wonder why we hired someone like her. Oh, don’t get me wrong, she was sweet and beautiful. She had a wide, perfect smile. But her name was Queenie. Really?! That’s what her wings said. I asked her if that was her birth name, and she said yes! Again, really?! Everything would have been fine except she had an attitude such that she looked down on all others. She really was a queen, at least in her own eyes. For some reason, my personality allows very little tolerance for such behavior. Maybe it was the way I was raised. For whatever reason, she just rubbed me the wrong way! I tolerated her antics for the entire long first day. It was a six-leg day for us. That means we flew six flights in a row, without even stepping off the plane. Yes, it is brutal, both physically and mentally. But little did she know, Queenie made me smile and even laugh internally. You see, unaware she had done so, when she dressed in her clown suit for the day, she attached her wings upside-down. Well, based on her attitude, I decided not to tell her. You might think it to be mean of me, but somehow, I justified it with that little phrase, What goes around, comes around. I think a passenger finally brought it to her attention. When she asked me later why I didn’t tell her, I just said, We don’t have any royalty in our business, we are all on the same team. I felt a real need to bring her down to the level of the rest of the team. I haven’t seen her since. Maybe she realized she was in the wrong line of work.

Can you imagine for a moment, the fusing together of many different personalities, requiring them to basically live together in a confined space for three days? Well, that’s how it goes up here. There are those A type personalities.