The crew who are also something else: the crew who are nurses on days off, the crew who teach yoga on layovers, the crew who run a bakery with the sister
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#1 Air NZ, Auckland, six years, the Pacific, and I am also a part time marine biology student and a volunteer at the aquarium on days off, and the side hustle thread on here is about the money. This is about the other identity: the crew who are also something else, not for the money but for the self, and what the roster allows.
The second identities
The crew who are nurses on days off (the ex nurses who kept the registration and do the agency shifts: Megan will be one), the crew who teach yoga on layovers (the hotel gym class for the crew, the studio in the home city), the crew who run the bakery with the sister (the Air NZ crew member whose sourdough is at the Saturday market), the crew who are musicians (the Pacific crew in the church bands and the gig crews), the crew who coach the kids' rugby, the crew who are studying (the distance degree thread), the crew who are artists (the knit and draw thread), the crew who are the aquarium volunteer with the fish names. Every crew room has them and the identity is the thing the crew talk about on the jumpseat more than the job.
What the roster allows
The days off in blocks, which the second identity uses: the four days off at the aquarium, the week at the market, the layover yoga class. The predictability of a line (the US crew) or a fixed pattern (the European part timers) that lets the second thing be scheduled. The staff travel that lets the second thing be somewhere else. The job that ends when the doors open, which leaves the mind free for the other thing in a way the office does not.
What the roster does not allow
The second thing with a fixed weekly schedule (the Tuesday class, the Saturday shift) when the roster is two weeks out and changes. The second thing that needs the body (the nursing shift after a long haul is the thing Megan will have to manage). The second thing that needs the evening every week. And the second thing that becomes the first thing, which is the exit threads' subject and the moment the crew member knows.
Why the second identity matters
Paul's body thread said a life outside flying deliberately built is the thing that holds when the going phase comes. The second identity is that life. The crew who are only crew are the ones who burn out at the going phase; the ones with the aquarium or the sourdough or the yoga have somewhere to go. The job allows it more than most jobs and the crew who use the allowance last.
The honest difficulty
The tiredness, which takes the second identity's energy first. The roster, which eats the schedule. The sense, for some crew, that the second thing is the thing they should be doing and the flying is in the way, which is the exit's beginning and not a bad one.
For the forum
What is your second identity, and how does the roster treat it? The fish at the aquarium know my roster better than my mother does.
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#2 Air NZ, ex nurse, and the nursing registration kept and the agency shifts on days off is the plan and Grace's 'the nursing shift after a long haul' is the thing I will have to manage. The second identity is the one I came from. The roster will decide how much of it survives.
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#3 Virgin, peer supporter, and the crew who are only crew burning out at the going phase is the thing the peer supporters see most: the ones with the second identity have somewhere to go and the ones without have us. Grace has written why the second thing is the mental health thread's prevention.
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#4 LATAM Lima, and the layover kitchen thread is my second identity and the crew dinners are the aquarium. The roster eats the schedule and the kitchen does not need a schedule. The second things that survive are the ones without a Tuesday.
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#5 SAS Stockholm, and I am the crew member in a choir, which is the Tuesday thing the roster eats, and the choir has learned my roster and I have learned to miss the concerts. The Scandinavian fixed patterns help. The choir still loses.
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#6 Jet2 Manchester, and the sister's bakery with the Saturday market is a real thing at Jet2 Manchester too and the crew member whose sourdough it is swaps every Saturday off and the base lets her because the bread is good. The second identity with a market stall is the one the base protects.
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#7 Virgin, and the yoga on the layover at the hotel gym for the crew is my second identity and the bar is my first and the two are not compatible at the same hour and the roster lets me have both on different days. The second thing without a Tuesday survives, as Carmen says.