For 21-year-old Kelsey Starkweather, who works for Skywest, traveling the world isn't just a job or a passion. It's what she calls her "safe house," and it helped her discover an appreciation for a life she wasn't always sure she would be able to live out.
"It's now been a year since I left [my ex-husband]," she said, "and I look back and I'm like 'Wow. If I would have stayed in that marriage, would I still be alive?'"
Starkweather grew up in Driggs, Idaho, a small town with a population of around 1,660. She married her boyfriend, a member of the Marines, at age 19. She told INSIDER that they thought it was a good idea because that way they could live together, as the military only allows married couples to live together.
Two months after they got married, he became mentally and physically abusive.
"He made me feel the worst of myself," she said. "And then, when he started physically abusing me, that was the point where I was like, 'Well, I'm really not good enough for anyone, because who can hit someone that they love? If my own husband doesn't love me, then who can love me?'"
Starkweather managed to get out of the relationship, and filed for divorce. When she moved back in with her parents her mom suggested she apply to a job at Skywest Airlines that she had heard about.
Starkweather got the job, and said, "That's when everything started to fall together. I found an opening and I took it."
As a ramp agent at Skywest, Starkweather takes advantage of her free travel benefits.
"I wasn't really much of the adventurous type until I got this job,” she said.
She took her first solo trip to Yosemite National Park in November.
See the rest of the story at Business Insider