It’s hard to believe thirteen years went by in this small town. Our kids grew up here. I attended my dad’s church. I worked the same job, plus a couple of others, year after year. And, the hardest part of all, I buried my mom.

So many memories live inside these buildings. They hold laughter and routine and grief all at once. In this place, we learned the value of hard work and showing up, even when life was heavy. Especially when life was heavy.

What this time took from me was my naivety, and it tested my faith.

I always thought things would work out if we could just make it to the airlines. Once we left the ministry, I held onto the hope that if we could get through training and land a job, we would finally exhale. So much of those years felt like we were holding our breath.

But that’s not what happened.

We were so disappointed by the salary and the constant commuting. We did the research, of course, but no amount of planning prepares you for reality.

I spent most days working multiple jobs and taking care of the kids. Jeff traveled constantly, working his new side job out of hotel rooms. He lived on tuna fish and canned green beans. I lived on caffeine and crockpot meals. Most weeks, it felt like we passed each other in the night, and it took a toll on our mental health.

We held tightly to our faith; some days, it felt paper-thin. We thanked God for every work opportunity, but quietly, or at least we thought quietly, we groaned at the thought of more work. We needed it. We prayed for it. But it was hard, and it didn’t feel like there was a light at the end of the tunnel.

What helped us hang on was the idea that we were building something.

We said it often, especially in the bleak moments. We’re building something. There was a future out there that allowed for slower days, less travel, and some financial relief.  We believed that if we could just hold on, it would eventually get better. The airline industry runs on seniority alone. As the days, months, and years pass, you inch your way up the list. Slowly, schedules ease. Pay improves.

We started late. Pilots younger than Jeff were higher on the list, and even when you try not to let that discourage you, it does.

One thing I am deeply proud of is that we never gave up. I know it was the strength of God that carried us through even the most chaotic seasons. Every year brought a little progress. We moved a little farther up the list. And every year, we tried to celebrate the small wins.

That’s how we stayed hopeful when hope felt faint.

Those years were long and hard, but they were meaningful too. I could still tell you most of the streets in that small town without ever looking at a map. I poured my heart into my work. I learned that I’m capable of enduring hard seasons and still finding reasons to smile. I invested myself in the church and loved those people with my whole heart. I watched my husband learn to commute through the most difficult situations. I watched his sacrifice for our family and his dedication to his new profession. Even on the toughest days, he rarely complained.

Jeff flew the smaller jets from 2006 to 2018. Something I haven’t mentioned yet, but this feels like the right place to say it, is that when he was hired by American Eagle, we were promised a flow-through. The idea was that pilots would eventually move from the smaller commuter jets at Eagle to the larger planes at American Airlines.

This is a big jump. Every pilot hopes for the day they can fly for one of the legacy airlines.

One of our greatest disappointments was how long that flow took. What we imagined as a steady progression turned into a slow, slogging process. Year after year passed with little movement, and hope had to be constantly renegotiated.

Then one glorious day, and I truly mean glorious, Jeff got the news: he was flowing through.

We celebrated big. That moment felt like the exhale we had been waiting for. But with the joy came decisions, including the biggest one we had always known was coming. Now it was time.

We had known all along that eventually we would have to leave this small town. We weren’t getting any younger, and living closer to a base would make our lives easier by reducing commuting and giving us more time at home. Timing is everything in this profession, and we trusted that when the time was right, God would make a way.

As a first officer, Jeff flew with captains from all over the country, and sometime in our thirteenth year of small-town life, he started asking questions. Where did they live? Did they like it? What did life look like there?

One place kept coming up in conversation: Charlotte, North Carolina. It was still on the eastern side of the country, in the Blue Ridge Mountains.  We often talked about enjoying the four seasons and the occasional snowfall.  We loved the idea of hiking, driving along mountain roads, and exploring a city.   Slowly, the idea began to take shape.

I wanted to leave because I knew it was best for my husband to be closer to a base, to commute less, to breathe a little easier. And I wanted more. A bigger town. A wider world.

But knowing it was right didn’t make it any less painful. Leaving still broke my heart.