When one door closes, God always opens another door. Sometimes that door is opened by someone we intersected with many years before.
Saving Me from Myself
Sometimes the Lord is actively involved in the intersections of our lives, yet we remain clueless of our Heavenly Father’s role as we blissfully or stubbornly breeze through those intersections. He is undoubtedly present to govern these intersections, waiting and enduring patiently to bless our lives. Although He is nearby, we frequently remain unaware of his proximity and unseen direction. Such is the case in my career history. Admittedly, I kept myself too busy to recognize the proximity of my Heavenly Father and His Son, our Savior, even Jesus Christ.
Being unmarried, I channeled my full energy and efforts into my management career at Budget Rent a Car. Although strictly accountable, I was largely autonomous and enjoyed setting the stage for the fledgling business to succeed. My intuitive business skills and freedom to act left me exhilarated as a young twenty- something with the generous latitude to explore outside the box and forge ahead. I was enthralled and intoxicated with my early successes which established our business as a formidable competitive force.
One of my particular challenges was staffing. In 1985 the local economy was booming and unemployment was understandably low. Despite the lack of qualified candidates, I was reluctant to lower the bar and settle for lesser quality in my staff. I recall having two open positions requiring a strong sense of personal discipline, an impeccable professional frontline appearance, and leadership skills along with a stellar work ethic.
I held out until I hired a dynamic duo of two young women near my age. They fit the image of iconic aspiring businesswomen. I was not to be disappointed. Of the two, Margo’s personal style of conducting business very closely aligned with mine. A career mother, she was raising four young children. Both she and her husband labored to provide for their family. I marveled at Margo’s seemingly effortless ability to juggle her work and family duties without compromising her work-related obligations in any way. She perfectly fulfilled her responsibilities with stunning exactness, professionalism accompanied by a natural, exceptional grace rarely found in the business world. Throughout her tenure, every day working with Margo was a sublime joy! She and her husband ultimately left Farmington and established themselves in the Dallas Fort Worth area. Along the way our business relationship morphed into a strong friendship bolstered by mutual respect and an easy camaraderie. An exemplary employee, Margo set the standard for all who followed her. I felt a debt of gratitude to repay her significant contributions at every opportunity. To this end, I provided her with the use of a rental car free of charge whenever she returned to visit her aging parents and extended family. We remained in casual contact as the years progressed. Don’t forget this segment of my story as I briefly depart. Margo will return to the story...
In the early 1990s, exponential growth in our company enlarged our footprint. It ultimately encompassed nine city operations by 2002 throughout the Four Corners and intermountain west. As time marched forward, I became increasingly busy as my duties throttled forward a thousandfold. My personal life was minimal to non-existent and confined to Church service, family, and close friends. I managed and oversaw multiple critical functions, embraced new technology, and thrived on an increasingly complex juggling act. The frequent travel became a heavy workload in itself. Every week I would drive and fly all across the United States to pursue fleet acquisition/disposition opportunities and resolve a myriad of convoluted concerns. Technology ultimately enabled me to work from anywhere with a cellular signal or internet connection. I was in perpetual motion on the ground and in the air. I lived out of a suitcase and seemingly flourished on the intense activity, especially when it ramped up to impossible levels. I couldn’t get enough!!
As the years transitioned into decades, I recognized troubling indications I was becoming dangerously weary and fatigued. I had long foregone vacations, opting instead, for long weekends and comp time wherever I could. I would routinely field over 100 phone calls per day and remain on call 24-7-365. My years of experience were both a blessing and a dreaded curse to me. I would never deny answering my phone at 2:00 am or stop whatever I was doing to support my people and effectively resolve any complex issue. I was more frequently running below empty on fumes with precious little sleep. After three decades, my aging body was feeling the strain, but I felt trapped in the success I had taken such pride in accomplishing. I felt like I was on a wildly spinning carousel with no chance of ending the ride alive. Despite my endless adrenaline rush, I felt a dark sense of foreboding and my demise if I didn’t take proactive measures to save me from myself.
My health had also begun to deteriorate. In my mid-forties, I still enjoyed relatively good health, but my earthly existence had been threatened more than a few times. I had been the victim in two rear-end collisions two weeks apart in Los Angeles and again on Interstate 17 between Phoenix and Flagstaff. During the same general time period, I was involved in a brutal collision at Purgatory Ski Resort with another skier. I miraculously walked away from all three death-defying events. However, they collectively contributed to my weakened spinal condition and likely enabled a disk rupture in my neck. Some months later, I awoke in my hotel room in Springfield, Missouri with a nagging ache in my right arm. Chronic pain soon overtook me and became a constant nagging companion. I sought credible medical attention for seven months before ultimately undergoing serious neurosurgery in 2007 at the University of Utah. A bulging disk was removed from my neck. It was reconstructed and augmented using two metal plates and a bone cadaver transplant (which later failed). Subsequently, my recovery process and frequent medical appointments in Salt Lake City required a five-year timeline. It left me with some permanent nerve damage and an uneasy feeling that a repeat performance could completely disable me. Of course, I continued to work at a rapid pace, unabated, rarely taking time to rest and recover.
Coupled with my exhaustion was a deep, wrenching sense of unhappiness. It was readily apparent to me that I had wrongly invested my identity in three decades of my profession while neglecting what should have mattered most. Although my wretched successful career was immensely satisfying, I worked in a less than healthy emotional environment. My autonomy had been strengthened over the years and was amply compensated financially. However, I harbored an abiding distrust in the corporate elements behind the scenes at the headquarters in New York. The exhausting, interminable struggle between good and evil raged hotly as I deftly and effectively resisted their efforts to radically undermine and ultimately overtake what I had so painstakingly built. I wasn’t going to forfeit any of my great success built carefully over three decades through my backbreaking labor. I was the only force for good but becoming vastly outnumbered as the vultures circled menacingly overhead. Their less than stellar corporate track record did nothing to impress me and I had no desire to engage in their wicked game. I knew in my heart they would divest themselves of me given their first opportunity. I was keenly and pointedly reminded of the evil “secret combinations” foretold in the Book of Mormon. Alive and well in my world, they were lurking in the shadows near our business, awaiting a moment of weakness in me I would never afford them.
Desperately unhappy yet pressing forward with a happy countenance, I took welcome solace in my Church service, my family and my friends. My travel schedule remained relentless and further increased. I found peace only when I could silence my phone on flights and take a much-needed ragged nap.
One afternoon I was flying on Southwest Airlines from Las Vegas to Lubbock. As I approached my seat, an angel appeared in the form of a Southwest Flight Attendant whom I instantly recognized! Margo, my favorite employee and dear friend since the 1980s, had secured a highly prized job with Southwest! I was aware of her transition to the airline industry where she had become a successful Inflight Instructor. Along with me and Budget Rent a Car, Southwest hit a home run out of the ballpark when they hired Margo. Seeing her after so many years in her new role filled me with immense pride! We enjoyed a long overdue reunion visit and I was treated like royalty en route to Lubbock.
Shortly after my meeting with Margo, the staggering burdens upon my shoulders pressed more unbearably upon me. Sometime in 2013, I completely surprised myself offering the blunt recommendation that our nine-city operation be dismantled and euthanized while we were at the top of our game. I was stunned and couldn’t fathom the bombshell I had dropped! I was offering up and scheduling my own demise in the process! My identity.... My world.... All that I had built... I was suddenly and inexplicably willing to give it up.
Few will understand that my occupation was absolutely everything to me. In the absence of a family, I had channeled all my energies into creating and nurturing something that had become a spectacular success, a source of great worldly pride to me. However, I was fatigued, weary beyond description, and fully at peace with the decision following my recommendation which was quickly endorsed.
The process to cease operations took an excruciating three years to complete and exacted yet another heavy toll upon me. I was silently emotional and felt a heartbreaking sense of deep sorrow and loss in dissolving our successful business operation. I hadn’t envisioned early retirement, but I was confident with the decision. I was at peace, even if I didn’t know where I would end up. I knew with absolute certainty in my soul that death would soon capture me if I didn’t act upon the prompting. I shed many tears of grief as I took the necessary, prolonged steps to deactivate my thriving, carefully built business and eventually “pull the plug.” I could identify with a grief-stricken parent removing a beloved child from life support who then wants to die alone in self-imposed exile, enveloped in inconsolable grief. It was a bitter, pain-filled, gut- wrenching ordeal. I still can’t believe I survived the process without extensive mental health counseling.
Near the end of my 32-year career, I recalled my longtime friend Margo and our Las Vegas/Lubbock reunion flight. I cautiously wondered in my heart if I could reinvent myself and find a place at Southwest Airlines. I was fully aware the odds were not in my favor. Knowing that Southwest rarely hires externally, I called my friend Margo anyway, then inquired about the possibility. Her excitement and reaction registered off the scale! She told me I’d be a perfect fit at Southwest! She very quickly set the stage initiating my application process. If and when the company decided to hire externally, I would be poised to apply quickly.
I hadn’t sought employment since 1984. Although my skills were considerable, I had no idea how to resurrect my resume, but I didn’t despair! I instantly knew what to do. A longtime best friend of mine was serving as the Director of Career Services at LDS Business College. He instructed me to come to Salt Lake City where he would teach me the skills of building an effective resume. My time was well spent as he made me do all the work myself. I soon uploaded my resume and application on Linked-In and Southwest’s employment portal. I then hoped for a call from Margo telling me Southwest was hiring. I was well aware it was a call that might never materialize.
Imagine my surprise in August of 2016 when Margo phoned me with the exciting news that Southwest was hiring Flight Attendants externally. I immediately updated my previously uploaded resume and completed the application process, envisioning a sea of applications overwhelming mine. Later I learned they received an overwhelming volume of applications and ultimately hired a minuscule percentage of applicants.
In September of 2016, I finally laid my successful car rental career to rest and walked away still not knowing what I would do with the rest of my life. The minuscule chance of a job at Southwest was still not in my favor and seemed like a fleeting dream never to be realized. My skill set would have plenty of outlets to find a new home, but I was in the early stages of grief, physically exhausted, and emotionally drained.
Years of excessive stress and anxiety were mercifully at an end. I fell across the finisher’s tape, signaling the end of my 32-year career. I was the originating first and last departing employee of the car rental empire I had dedicated my life to. It had all finally come to a quiet end without so much as a whisper of life. The conclusion was without fanfare, stunningly silent, and desolately lonely. I had alternately soared in the bright sunlight above the heights of the business and swam the stormy riptides in the depths of darkness. At the end, I was desperately alone without a bridge leading me to the comforts I felt I deserved. Despite my confidence in my decision to end it all, I had not a clue where I would go next. Would I fade away and become only a footnote in my own life?
Knowing I needed to remain active and avoid wallowing in certain debilitating depression, I contacted another of my best friends from 1980 Ricks College (now BYU-Idaho) who had recently completed a rigorous course of specialized study at our alma mater. I was shocked and delighted to learn the same program was offered in Farmington for the first time, only a few miles away from my home! Further, other dear friends of mine were administering the program. The collective guidance I received set me on an academic path that would bless my life beyond measure!
I returned to school with gusto and learned how to study again at the university level. How invigorating! Lifelong learning is a divine privilege holding the keys to greater quality of life, happiness, success, and personal fulfillment. I experienced great satisfaction in online university learning which instilled great confidence in me. I was pleased to know I was still relevant and my ability to learn was thriving!
Throughout the application review process at Southwest, I was competed with career airline professionals and others who had achieved success in their chosen fields of business, health care, law enforcement, legal services, education, and a plethora of other professions. As my application progressed through phone and face-to-face interviews in Dallas, I experienced calm and peace yet again. I felt very confident and comfortable in each interview setting and screening activity. I was ultimately selected and underwent a background check and drug test before being scheduled for a training class in October of 2017.
I continued my college studies, completing three semesters at BYU-Idaho before transitioning to Southwest Airlines three months later. My resurrected ability to study proved invaluable in my intensive training at Southwest. Following my aggressive studies and preparation at Southwest Airlines University, my dear friend Margo presented my wings to me during the graduation ceremony. Flashbacks to my decision to hire this remarkable woman filled my heart with indescribable gratitude to my Heavenly Father. God had placed this angel at multiple critical intersections of my life when I had not so much of a clue of His tender mercies.
I’ve been at Southwest now for almost four years and find great satisfaction and fulfillment. I never imagined I could reinvent myself and experience the great blessings I am now afforded. I’ve found a welcoming occupational home that is far different from my previous station in life. My values and passions are nurtured and appreciated. I’m humbled by the immense trust and confidence placed in me. I have become a frontline ambassador for one of the most admired companies in the world and among the top 10 best places to work in the United States. Though I’m not dependent upon the income, it’s proven a wise economic move for me. Additionally, the perks and benefits are numerous and generous.
I’m based in Denver, but continue to live in rural New Mexico. I commute by flight to my assignments and generally work as much or as little as I choose. I find myself working with an incredible array of highly disciplined professionals whose work ethics closely mirror mine. The culture at Southwest is very conducive to my personality and I feel very much at home. I recently met a retiring employee who, at age 80, had just completed 26 years at Southwest. Her journey at Southwest began at age 54 just as mine did! I should be so fortunate to enjoy a 26-year run doing something I dearly love!
Concluding Reflections -
When I received the invitation to submit a couple of stories to Maria’s blog, I was relaxing comfortably in Santa Barbara at my hotel. “Coincidentally,” I was actively contemplating the Lord’s involvement in the intersections of my life and marveling at His love for me, a Child of God. Although outgoing, I’m a very private person. It’s out of character for me to willingly submit a story to a blog for public consumption. However, I recognized Maria’s invitation was inspired. Additionally, she had been placed at an intersection where I needed to share something that may benefit someone.
Could anyone have imagined the unlikely progression of events beginning in 1989 involving someone who appeared to be a perfect match for me and who figured so prominently in my life? Who would have guessed that my wise hiring decision in 1985 would prove so pivotal in placing me at the right places and times so as to benefit me in the twilight of my career at Budget Rent a Car? Would anyone recognize the “chances” of two of my best friends also being placed strategically to underscore and support my transition from one career to another so late in my life?
Though my stories are divinely amazing to me, they are hardly unique. I am hardly unique. Our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ harbor an abiding love for us we cannot begin to comprehend. Although the Lord’s involvement in the direction of my life is obvious to me in these two stories, I realize there are countless other critical intersections where I was completely unaware of the Lord’s nearby direction. How could I have missed them? How could I have been so narcissistic and oblivious, stubbornly pursuing my personal agenda without thinking to call upon my Heavenly Father? The Lord’s tender mercies at critical intersections were readily apparent and revealed to me only in the throes of grief, despair, fatigue, and when I was more likely to be humble and teachable.
When we draw our hearts close to righteous close friends, trusted family members, and those who love us unconditionally, we will more clearly see our Father is ever-present, even in our unworthiness and less than perfect stations. He desperately wants us to qualify for all the blessings available to us through the merits of our Savior.
I believe pre-mortal covenants were carefully established between our Heavenly Father, His Son Jesus Christ, and those who are closely associated with us. When we need the greatest guidance at the intersections of our lives, He is absolutely near us! Heavenly Father, in His infinite love and wisdom, never leaves us unattended. Certainly, we bear the responsibility to make choices based upon gospel principles and properly exercise our divine agency. That aside, our Heavenly Father figures prominently in the intersections of our lives. He has promised to never leave us. Recognizing He is near, we can take confidence, comfort, and encouragement to move toward Him in all our actions.
As I mentioned at the onset of my remarks in my first story, I haven’t yet arrived at a level of reflective perfection where I can nod with confidence and fully acknowledge the hand of the Lord in my life, especially at the critical intersections. I remain a significant work in progress. I pray I can be a worthwhile instrument in the hands of the Lord in blessing the lives of others at the intersections of their lives, even in my less than perfect current station. My elder brother and Savior, Jesus Christ works in tandem with our Father in Heaven. They serve jointly and dutifully to bless us at the intersections of our lives. Let us avail ourselves of this incredible gift, acknowledging our weakness and resolve to become what we have been created to achieve as sons and daughters of God.
I leave my testimony of these truths with you in the name of our Savior, even Jesus Christ, who makes all things possible unto us.
I conclude with the words from my heartfelt, favorite hymn, “I Know That My Redeemer Lives.”
“He lives to grant me rich supply. He lives to guide me with His eye.
He lives to comfort me when faint.
He lives to hear my soul’s complaint.
He lives to silence all my fears. He lives to wipe away my tears.
He lives to calm my troubled heart.
He lives all blessings to impart.” - Lyrics by Samuel Medley (1738-1799) Included in the first LDS hymnbook (1835)
Disclaimer: The views I have expressed are solely my own. In this forum, I do not speak for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints or Southwest Airlines. The photographic images contained in this blog are only those I have taken myself and are not the work of others.
Submitted by Ron Frame from Aztec, NM
April 2021
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