BEING A PILOT

Hello everyone. I’m Brian Toner. I’m a pilot. I travel around the world to cool and exotic places, eat new and interesting foods and meet a lot of different people. Doesn’t it sound amazing! But, the life of a pilot can also be difficult. For example: 

·        We don’t make much money. We make about $40,000 a year.

·        When I go to a new country, I never know the local time there. We travel to too many places in a short time and it is impossible to learn all the time zones. The funny thing is, when I talk to my friends and family back home, they all ask the same question, “What time is it there?”

·        I can’t make plans, because I don’t have a set schedule. It is hard to have a normal social life when you don’t know where you will be two days later.

·        Yes, we fly to exotic places, but we don’t get to see them. When we go to an exotic place, we usually stay at a hotel with a view of the airport. We need to sleep between flights, so we don’t go out to see these places. We just don’t have enough time.

·        You miss your family. This is the most difficult thing about being a pilot. More than once, I missed important days. I missed my daughter’s first day at school, my wife’s birthday, our wedding anniversary, etc. I wasn’t there when our old dog died, and I couldn’t soothe my sad daughter.