Originally published in The Newnan Times-Herald, read here.
In late October of 2024, a Delta flight landed in Stuttgart, Germany, for the last time. Unaware of that fact, I sat in the gate area reading my book.
A short time passed, then a Delta Red Coat Supervisor took to the microphone, and there was something different about her tone. She was asking for our attention; she said that she had something very important and personal to share. My ears perked up. As a 10-year-plus Diamond Medallion and million-plus miler on Delta, you know the routine, and I knew something was different. She was emotional.
“Ladies and Gentlemen, today you will be boarding the very last Delta flight from Stuttgart, Germany, to Atlanta, Georgia.” I turned to see her standing behind the counter, and her body language told me she was trying to hold it together.
Her colleagues, the pilots, flight attendants, and even some of the ground crew were all standing near the desk and boarding doors listening. As she continued to speak to us, it was clear to each passenger that her heart was full of gratitude, thankfulness and sadness. It was beautifully painful, and when she finished, everyone stood as if she had delivered a keynote speech and gave the Delta Team a hearty round of applause.
I thought about what she said the entire flight home, rescanning all the faces in my mind, standing with her. We assume departures will always have arrivals and arrivals will always have departures, until they do not. That’s the lightning strike that grabs us, scares us, and recenters us.
The lightning strike shows up when we hear that a person has passed away. It shocks us because we say, I was just with them or saw them the other day and they were fine. It was a departure we expected to be another arrival.
Perhaps you got fired. For so long, we left our home as part of our normal routine to go to work, until we didn’t. No more arrivals, the departure was canceled.
The Doctor tells us about the test results. Now the value and importance of sleep, possessions, and relationships have all been redefined. Time and relationships cannot have enough arrivals, and we can’t help wondering whether a departure we never considered may never be followed by another arrival.
I fail at this, but I try to treat each interaction as if it might be the last, because when we depart from each other there may never be another arrival. The kind I never see coming and have the opportunity to prepare for, like the Delta Airlines Team in Stuttgart, Germany.
I often wonder how our neighborhoods, community, friendships, and families would change if we spoke to each other, if we had advanced knowledge that there would never be another arrival. For me, I never end a conversation in person or over the phone with my family without saying “I love you.”
I will leave you with that. I am Scott Lackey. Until next time.
