Lee Child writes the Jack Reacher novels, and although I usually enjoy them very much, in the latest, Running Blind one of the female characters (the above-mentioned FBI agent) spends all kinds of time driving because she refuses to fly. Now I have to ask myself, would the FBI spends thousands of dollars on an agent who refuses to fly?
If it makes a difference to answering the question: She is a “profiler”, and perhaps these people are very valuable to the Bureau, and exceptions are made, but Child doesn’t go into that part of it.
Not familar with the book or FBI personnel practices but as a general rule if she’s a critically necessary “talent” most organizations will accommodate just about any legal, non-life threatening quirk so long as the “talent” produces. I would imagine, however, that if she had this “quirk” in real life she’d better be good enough to put her hands on the victims clothing and say “Quasimodem did it in the parlor with a pair of pinking shears because of his fear of emotional intimacy”, if she wanted to keep her job.
So far as I know Duck Duck Goose is the only person who has this power in real life.
My oldest sister had a big phobia about driving cars. She could ride in them OK, but when she got behind the wheel herself she would have a panic attack - heart palpitations, hyperventilating, the whole nine yards. Even before she started the car.
Anyhow - over the years she talked a number of employers into accomodating her phobia with car pools and even hired drivers if she had to travel. Mind you, my sister was not some super-expert hot-shot in a narrow field. She was a clinical psychologist working with battered women, poor folks in the public welfare system, and college students. The last job she held required a 150 mile commute - she would have someone drive her to Ann Arbor and stay overnight at my other sister’s house (nearby the university), then get a ride back in a couple days so she had the weekend at home. So it can be done, but you have to be really good at what you do in order for the employer to put up with the foible. But, as long as you can get the job done and done well, getting to and from in an unconvential manner might well be overlooked
People with a fear of flying would probably find it easier to have folks accomdate them, since fear of flying is seen as much more understandable than fear of driving.
