Hi my name is John Gries I've been at
Southwest Airlines for 25 years. A captain
for 22 of those and I live in Haslet
Texas. So we were walking down the jetway
and my father-in-law Mr. Spain came up
to the Captain and said are you
flying this thing and the Captain said I
sure am and and Mr. Spain said well I
was a pilot in World War II and at that
point
the Captain took him in said well you're
coming with me
how long has it been since you've seen
inside one of these things. He came up
front and sat down and went to go on the
right seat and I said no you need to get
in the left seat and so he went over and
got the left seat and we sat down I said
well this is some of the same
instruments that you had 50 years ago
when you were flying and he said now it
looks familiar and so we sat there and
talked and just visited just
sat there with a piece of living history
and he honored me by coming up front
like that. Every time I walk on a plane I
always check to see who the pilot is
I've always wanted to get to see
him again and I always hated that I didn't
get his name that day so that I could
have contacted him and let him know know what a difference made
He came up to my flight deck that means a lot to me I mean this guy's living history with all his
experience and everything if you see in the picture he at one point time he had his
hand resting up here on the yoke like
this it's like
that's a pilot it's just a pilot.
You know my father-in-law's health began
to deteriorate very quickly after that
trip
and he went into a home and he had one
picture by his bed
and it was it was him and the captain
 up in the cockpit he was he was very
proud of that picture but I think it
just spoke volumes of how honored he felt
I felt like I want to be around him I want
him to come up and sit in the flight deck
just just tell me anything just tell me
story just tell me anything and to think
of a man that had that type of worldly
experience got up in my flight deck it was an honor
I think he just had closed
a chapter in his life and didn't really
want to go back there but after this one
gesture that the captain did you know he
really opened up even about just some of
the stories but we had not even heard and
so that was a really cool experience for
me to get to know more about him.
And it really was maybe 15 or 20 minutes
that had this sort of huge impact on our
family I've taken it really is something
that I try to do as I travel to just
sort of watch out for the people that
had a little bit of a lost look in their
eyes and it's really hard to understand
how big of an impact that is just a short
little gesture can make
