Cozmo's Run-In With The Rev.; or Racial Equality: a Passion in Three Acts

Overture

Words cannot adequately describe how crappy my day was yesterday.  4:00AM wake-up call for a 6:00AM flight to Chicago and an 8:30AM Chicago meeting.  As soon as I land, I learn our meeting has been delayed until noon because the other side's attorney failed to read the closing documents over the weekend.  There's 3 hours of sleep I'll never see again.  Finally, when we do meet, said attorney starts going off about contract vagaries in a clear effort to continue to stall the deal.  I spend a half an hour yelling at the attorney about him not being commercially driven, then three hours of brain damage while he and our attorney reviewed reps & warranties.  The result?  No deal, at least another week of pain, and my closing-day suit wrinkled - All because of the jackassery of one shitty attorney.  I flee Chicago in disgust.

Act One: Cozmo Sees Eye-To-Eye with The Rev.

Entering O'Hare, I see that all the flights to LaGaurdia are horribly delayed.  Quick thinking and survival instinct instruct me to get on stand-by list for the next available flight (scheduled for 5:00PM) instead of waiting for the 7:00PM.  After suffering many injustices in the security line, I hustle to the gate  I sit down, open up the new Esquire with Howard on the cover - And there he is, sitting across from me in front of Gate K-3 and the Mont Blanc store, The Reverend Jesse Jackson.

That's him alright.  The man who spent his early life marching with Dr. King, starting Operation PUSH in the '70's and the Rainbow Coalition in the '80's.  The Man who credibly ran for President, twice.  The man who has sat across from the table from the world's political and business leaders on countless occasions.  And Jesse is looking at me with a deep stare and his graying mustache wrapping around a frown that has shamed some of the world's most powerful and ruthless people into action for his causes. 

I resist the urge to ask Jesse if he remembers the day Mrs. Cozmo stumped him in a Q&A session at our college so thoroughly that he ceased rhyming and walked over to her podium and pretended to hit her in the head as he hugged her.  I also resist the urge to ask him if he thought "Don't Let Me Down, Hymietown" was as funny as I found it.  In turn, Jesse resists calling me a cocky bastard in an over-priced suit.  Our detente secured, I look up at the standby board and see "Cra/C" two rows above "Jac/J", and sit back to wonder how it it will all play out.  Jesse's still frowning at me, and I frown back thinking "Miserable together in O'Hare - if that isn't racial equality, I don't know what is."

Act Two: Boarding The Plane

Cozmo's name comes up first, and I contain my smirking until the jetway, thinking of Bond-eque puns to gloat to Jesse.  Hey Jesse, Ain't to PUSHing your way up the Standby List.  No, there ain't no Rainbow to the end of this jetway.  I get into my seat, 7F - bulkhead-window and see that there are like 14 other seats on the plane and start to feel bad about my gloat session. 

Jesse comes onto the plane two minutes later, using whatever super platinum bling executive status he had to bump some toe-headed kid out of First Class and into 7D.  For some reason that could only be explained as a "Pay-It-Forward" guilt trip by this kid's mother, she gives her son her seat and moves next to me in 7D.  Jesse and I share a nod as he sits in 6A.  Well played, Mr. Jackson.

More people filter onto the plane including a young family with a really crappy mom who refused to check her stroller and started flailing at the overhead bins.  The male and female co-workers in 8E&F start making fun of her to her face, exacerbating the situation until the stewardess steps in and removes the stroller from the passenger compartment of the plane.  7E remains ominously open as they prepare to close the door and push back from the gate at 7:30.

Act Three: The Comeuppance

Seconds before the door closes.  A crappy couple, made up of a Frowning Woman with entirely too much luggage and a skinnyfat Schlub with no chin make a bee-line for the bulkhead and start fussing with the over-head bins.  The are followed by a gate agent when I catch a glimpse of Schlub's boarding pass - the Seat says 7F.  Oh SHIT!  The gate agent says to me, "Are you Mr. Cramer [Yes, Ma'am].  I'm sorry Sir, you will have to move to seat 30E."

I look at her incredulously and blurt out in full voice.  "30E!!!  You want me to leave my bulkhead window seat for a middle seat a row in front of the latrine in between the engines for two people that came 2 hours late to their own flight?!?"  drawing the attention of the 15 people in my immediate vicinity.  Her cold response was, "Yes sir."

Collecting my bag and jacket from the overhead with as much dignity as I could muster, turn to the gate agent and say in my best British Midshipman's voice "Shall I swab the deck on the way back there, matey?", and the first three rows of coach and the last three rows of first explode in laughter - and I catch a (little bit too) hearty guffaw from Jackson to my left as I wheel and slump rearwards.

Settling in to 30E between two cheder boys (certainly God's punishment for the Hymietown thought), the captain gets on the squawk box and tells the plane that we will be on a ground hold for another hour and a half because of weather delays at LaGuardia.  My thoughts went straight to the Rev., no doubt giving the stewardess in the front of the plane the same frightful frown he gave me a half hour before and I thought "both of us still miserable at O'Hare - let the racial equilibrium continue!"

Post Script

Manhattan - 12:05AM - So, I'm telling my cabbie, Raj about my crappy day..." And then, in the airport, I saw Jesse Jackson."

To which Raj looked in the mirror and responded flatly, "Michael Jackson's sister?"

Comments

[KHAN-yeezy]

No doubt Jesse was meeting with Oprah about the chapelle episodes that are coming out soon...

[soup nazi]

Brilliant storytelling.

[Jackie]

"After suffering many injustices in the security line."

Please expound.

Oh yeah, and how did the missus stump the good rev?

Awesome Post!

[Cozmo]

Long story, Chiles, and I've already written a long story today. Suffice it to say that most cock-sure politcal types (whatever their stripes) don't like getting depantsed by college sophmores.

[briandtw]

I got stuck next to a 400-pound guy (seriously...I'm not exaggerating -- he was 350 at a minimum) flying to PHL Tuesday morning (an early-ass 6:30 a.m. flight myself).

Motherfucker! If you're not going to exercise some self-control, at least don't get a job where you have to fly and squeeze me into the aisle. I have a knack of getting stuck next to the fattest guy on the plane.

[briandtw]

That had absolutely nothing to do with Cozmo's story, of course. I just needed to vent. I fucking hate air travel in this country.

[DFS]

I feel your pain brian. I like going to different places and getting there as quickly as possible; I hate the process of flying though. I am 6'4" and planes just arent built for people over 6 feet tall

[Cozmo]

You gotta keep hope alive - Brian. Keep hope alive that the flight home will bring you next to a cute 25 year old advertising copy editor who's into sports. That's your only recorse here, bro.

[briandtw]

I did get seated next to a cute lawyer for a pharmacutical company on the last flight home from Philly. Of course, she was married.

And, of course, I'm married. So there's that.