Thankful for the Sisters Beside Me

Thanksgiving looks a little different when you’re a flight attendant. While most families are gathering around the table, passing plates and sharing stories, many of us are zipping through the sky — guiding passenger's home, ensuring safety, and doing what we do best: serving with grace.

And sometimes, if we’re honest, it stings a little. Missing the laughter. Missing the warmth. Missing the familiar faces waiting when we walk through the door. But Thanksgiving, for many flight attendants, doesn’t happen on one specific day of the year. It happens whenever our schedules align, whenever our loved ones can gather, whenever we finally get the chance to exhale at home. Our holiday is fluid — just like the lifestyle we chose.

But here’s the beautiful part: we are never truly alone.

There is a sisterhood among flight attendants that is unlike anything else. A bond built not only in the aisles and jumpseats, but in the moments only we understand — delayed flights, long overnights, back-to-back trips, sudden reroutes, holidays spent in hotels instead of our homes.

We may not share the same blood, but we share the sky.

This Thanksgiving, I’m especially grateful for the women who stand beside me in this unique journey. The ones who check on me when I’m quiet. The ones who make me laugh at 4 a.m. briefings. The ones who send a “Happy Thanksgiving, sis” text even though they’re working across the country. The ones who know—truly know—what this life feels like.

Sisterhood is our chosen family. It’s the table we gather around when the world is moving too fast. It’s the warmth we carry with us, from aircraft to aircraft, from city to city.

And that is something to be profoundly thankful for.

So, to every flight attendant spending this holiday in the air, in a crash pad, on a layover, or walking through another airport terminal—know that you are seen, appreciated, and surrounded by a community that loves you deeply.

Happy Thanksgiving, sisters in the sky. Here’s to gratitude, connection, and the bond that keeps us soaring.