55 Years on Campus

By Detra Enman

55 Years On Campus is a career memoir of a poor, skinny, bucktoothed,

shy, loner, C-student and underprivileged white girl, who shares her

nonpolitically correct journey and evolved into an outgoing six-figured

career woman.

Based on a true story of her many careers on the campus she calls life! From

servicing in the United States Air Force--experiencing the world, having

diverse jobs--to serving on private jets as a flight attendant and lessons she

learned along the way.

This journey will inspire, educate, and entertain you. She has come to believe

that there isn't anything you can't do. You are the only thing in your way!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Nov 10, 2016
• ISBN: 9781683481614

Book preview

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Copyright © 2016 Detra Enman

All rights reserved

First Edition

PAGE PUBLISHING

Conneaut Lake, PA

First originally published by Page Publishing 2016

I have tried to recreate events, locales and conversations from my memories of them. In order to maintain their anonymity in some instances I have changed the names of individuals and places, I may have changed some identifying characteristics and details such as physical properties, occupations, places of residence, units and companies.

ISBN 978-1-68409-977-1 (pbk)

ISBN 978-1-68348-161-4 (digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

About the Author

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to acknowledge the men and women in uniform that I have had the honor to service with, learn from, be inspired by and laugh with. This includes the folks in the military and aviation uniforms! Thank you very much for my lessons in this life and the experiences that enriched my soul!

Thank you for letting me share my crazy career journey with you. My mother had requested me to write about my many different careers from twenty years in the Air Force to the current day as a personal corporate flight attendant.

I wrote this for my mother and her WOW (Windows or Widowers) club of high dessert Victorville, California, to educate and entertain on the different jobs I was involved with. The WOW club asks all their family members to participate in this career program. I would like to dedicate this to them, as they inspired me to publish my journey to share with you in the hopes that I might educate and entertain you. One of the most difficult things to do is to write about oneself. I have nothing to brag, boast, or prove. I am just a simple gal who is sharing her job journey—in which I never feared or limited myself.

This part of my campus life I will call the Bitch is Decent.

I was a twenty-four-year-old administrative Air Force specialist looking for adventure and a different job. I applied for a special duty assignment and got selected to cross train into a special duty assignment. Combat land/water survival school—POW camp training was mandatory for my special duty assignment as a flight attendant in the Air Force to fly presidents, ambassadors, generals, congressman, world leaders, and politicians. Your tax dollars came in handy flying these folks around the world—and when I needed a beer in Africa! Thank you all!

There I was, Criminal 74, (my new name) in a prison box being managed by Air Force personnel pretending to be East German soldiers. I am only allowed to give name, rank, and serial number when I am a captured prisoner. In my prison box, three feet by three feet and five feet tall with cold cement floors, no light except the ray coming through the crack of the door, I had what no five-star hotel would have, and that was a designer coffee can by Folgers to try to aim into when I had to relieve myself of liquid and solid treats. In Layman's terms, peepee and poopoo. You don't want to miss the can, as it will go all over your little box home. Come to think of it, I have acquired some good skills living in this prison box—if things don't work out for me.

Whenever a soldier would come to my box to interrogate me, he asked, Is the bitch decent? And I would have to respond, The bitch is decent. This was a way of letting them know that I wasn't going potty into my designer coffee can toilet.

The next thing I encounter was a visit from three soldiers. Is the bitch decent?

The bitch is decent.

They swung open the door to this box and started to ask me about the mission I was on. I can only give rank, name, and serial number. They were yelling at me in my face and made me turn around to face the wall. I kept telling myself this is training, and these guys are Air Force personnel. If I just play along, learn from the experience, it will end soon.

Then I noticed they were checking out my ass. After all, I was a hot young thing back then. I started laughing (something I realize I do in uncomfortable situations), which broke the training mode.

The next thing they did was throw water all over me and left. Well, this was December, in the mountains of Washington State, somewhere— to this day, I don't know where. They transported us with bags on our heads from the Air Force base to the training area and my box home. I was so cold that my nipples tore holes in my uniform—not to mention I'm now wet. Freezing cold and now exhausted from all the drama of my first day in my box. I want to lie down in a ball on the floor to use my own body heat to warm up and catch some sleep before my next encounter from the prison guards.

I hear them torturing and abusing the other prisoners. I dread my turn. However, my floor was wet, and my options are to stand or lay in the water on the cement floor, which would freeze my body like an old piece of steak in a refrigerator that decayed because the package was left open causing freezer burns.

My academic portion of my training taught us to take care of ourselves to survive in a real-life POW prison experience. Ask for things and be smart about it. So I yell out to