I'd love to claim courage, but it's more like a dose of reality intertwined with stupidity and inability to BS my way through another regional interview. I bailed from a regional with an upgrade class in my back pocket to go to an indoc class at a "last job in aviation you'll ever have" kind of place (they literally told us that both at the interview and on the first day of indoc). Since I didn't have the turbine PIC there were no options for me at the time of furlough to get on with one of the few ACMI carriers that were hiring. Same with JetBlue. My ASA interview didn't go so well, because, quite frankly, after 11 years in various cockpit I just wasn't playing their game and it was quite transparent. Nothing like sitting in a technical interview being asked "at what speed would you hold over XXX at 17,000ft?", and answering "as slow as I can without putting the flaps / slats out". Dude said it was the best answer he'd ever heard, but wrong... Same type of stuff with HR. She asked if I wanted my son to follow my footsteps into the cockpit. Answered "hell no" and told her why.

I sat through that interview knowing that I would be commuting to hell if hired, would be committing my son to going to daycare, spending money on a crashpad, airport food, etc. Before walking in I knew that at 100 / hrs per month credit with the airline it would cost me money to go fly an RJ.

The reality is we all still want to fly, and a single engine Cessna isn't going to cure the disease. That's when you enter rehab for pilots. Coaching kid's sports, working out, expanding hobbies you never had time for, etc. Even waiting on a recall that may or may not come, allowing you to have experienced some "working retirement" while you're still young enough to enjoy it, but old enough to appreciate it.

I'd still gander that if there was an RJ operator who offered a decent schedule / work rules, and a decent paycheck, we'd be lining up. Until then, they can cancel flights....