Growing up, my parents would constantly say they were, "making the best of a bad situation."  They always said it laughingly, with a hillbilly accent (it must have came from a line in a movie or a comedy show). "Situation" sounded more like "sitchy-a-shun." I began to hate the phrase. Why were we getting in to so many "bad situations" in the first place?

When my parents were newly married, my mom fell in love with an over-priced little dinette set, but they didn't have much money and couldn't justify buying it.

When Christmas rolled around, my dad decided to surprise her with it. He went out and bought it and strapped it onto his car. On the way home it broke loose, blew off the car and broke into a hundred pieces. He pulled over, picked up all the pieces and put them in his trunk.

When he got home he asked my mom to come outside to see what he'd gotten her for Christmas. She looked into the trunk full of sticks and asked him what it was.

"Kindling," he answered. I can just hear his big laugh.

My mom's response after hearing what it had been? "Oh well."

She could have said something like, "You'd think, being an engineer and all, that you might have figured out a way to strap it down so it wouldn't blow off."

But no, that wasn't her way and it certainly wasn't his. It was just the beginning of hundreds of times they'd be "making the best of a bad situation."

I was down in Florida visiting my parents when I came upon an interesting factoid claiming an average four-year old laughs about 400 times a day while an average adult laughs only about 15 times a day. I was curious how many times my dad thought he laughed in a day. He figured he and my mom laughed at least 100 times a day. My dad was not prone to exaggeration. In fact, to my knowledge he never exaggerated at all. Perhaps because of his background as a pilot and an engineer, he was more apt to make calculated guesses. Thus, there was no doubt in my mind that he and my mom really were laughing that much. It occurred to me that Bob and I weren't having near as much fun, that our comparatively paltry amount of shared laughter might be propelling us towards the big "D" (just kidding, Babe).

My dad always laughed easily and often. I'm happy to say I personally made him laugh easily and often. Oh, how I miss that big laugh of his!  Providentially, I made a television debut in 1980 that made him laugh for almost twenty years.

At the time I worked part time at my parents' travel agency and was often used as an errand girl. I've never been a morning person, always running late and taking minimal time to get ready. That particular morning was especially hectic. I'd overslept and didn't have time to shower or put on make-up. When I got to work, I was sent to the store to pick up a few items. When I got there I noticed a news crew set up in the parking lot. I vaguely wondered what the "big story" was but was more concerned about getting in and out without being seen by anyone.

Just as I was about ten paces from the door, the news crew started running towards me, like I was the big story. I tried to ignore them and picked up my pace a bit. They were persistent, saying they just had a few quick questions. Fine. They'd realize soon enough that I didn't know jack about whatever it was they were covering.

"Did you vote yesterday?" the reporter asked, putting a microphone up to my face.

I couldn't have looked more bewildered. You would have thought I'd never heard of the word "vote." What in the world would I have voted about?

I managed a meek, "Uh...no I didn't."

"Can you tell us why you didn't vote?" the man persisted.

Deciding honesty was the best policy, I answered, "I guess it was just...ignorance."

That seemed to satisfy them and they went on to find their next victim.

I didn't think much more about it until I got home and was eating dinner with my parents. I told them about my "interview" that morning.

"You don't think they'd ever put that on...do you?" The idea horrified me. I didn't want anyone to see me like that, much less an entire television audience. "What vote were they talking about anyway?"

Turns out it was Michigan's primary and there had been an unusually low voter turnout.
Please God, don't let me be on TV.

My dad turned to the right channel and just as we tuned in they started the segment with, "Here are some of the reasons voters gave for not voting in yesterday's primaries..."

And there was my greasy, bigger than life face emblazoned across the TV screen, squeaking out the excuse, "Ignorance." The "I guess..." part didn't make the cut, just the word "ignorance."

My dad howled with laughter. Every time I thought he had exhausted the laughter out of his system, he'd look at me and imitate that nasally, squeaky voice: "Ignorance." It would start him roaring all over again.

From that point on he could never use the word "ignorance" without using my particular enunciation. He would laugh just as hard as if he had just witnessed it. It makes me smile knowing I did something that made my dad laugh that heartily, for that many years.

I used to think a gorilla could do my job. Not anymore. I think it would shock most people to know just how much we need to know. Not just know, but prove our mental and physical prowess each and every year. It's either that or lose our jobs. Plus I doubt gorillas love people and love to travel.

Oddly enough, the more I fly the more I think passengers believe we're nothing short of little Einstein's.

They believe our geography knowledge is second to none. We can name every mountain range we're flying over, every body of water, each little city...we can even discern state lines.

They believe we are capable of predicting the future. We can tell them if the weather is going to affect our arrival or departure time. I always thought it would be fun to carry around a magic eight ball and when asked if they're going to make their connection, I could consult it and show them the answer: "Not likely." We can tell them if their seat mates are going to make the flight. Would they be able to spread out? I could give the eight ball another shake: "Fat Chance."

This is only a tiny sampling of how deep and vast they believe our knowledge is. Something mind-numbing must happen to them when they step on board. Many have trouble deciding if they should head into the cockpit or down the aisle. They have difficulty matching their seat number with the row they're in. They can't decipher diagrams that tell them whether they're at the window or the aisle. They can't distinguish the ashtray (that's in the center of the door!) from the door handle to get into the lavatory. On doors you need to push to get into, there's a big sign on the door that says, "PUSH." They find this so baffling I need to do a charade-like illustration of "pushing" to help them out. They can't remember the definitions of "occupied" and "vacant."

Remember those toys we played with when we were little? The ones that had different shapes that fit into different holes? Only the square shaped piece fit into the square shaped hole? That concept escapes them. At least we didn't break the toy trying to force a piece into a hole where it CLEARLY doesn't fit.

They have trouble differentiating the reading light button from the flight attendant call button...even though the light button has a picture of light bulb on it and the call button has a picture of a person on it.

I remember when Dane was only four years old and had to sit by himself on a flight. I drilled him on how to act. "Have your order ready, don't you dare ask what we have, tell them as quickly and clearly as possible what you want, say 'please' and 'thank you' and then sit there and look at your books."

The whole time I'm giving him his "coaching" he's staring up at the flight attendant call button and at the end of my explicit instructions to ONLY push it if there's an emergency, he adds, "....or if I want another drink."

"NO! Haven't you been listening?? I said NEVER push it unless there's an emergency."

"Why on the button is the lady carrying a drink?" he asks, logically enough.

"Why? Because flight attendants didn't design them, that's why."

And if some of our Einstein flight attendants did design airplanes?  The flying public would be much happier...and so would we.