A few days after Christmas last year I was at the Grande Dame Walmart hitting up the sales aisle looking for a good perfume–and there I saw it, the perfume I’ve been wanting to purchase since 1988 when it first came out. That is a long time to wait my friends. Just like flying. In fact, before Sunday morning I hadn’t flown in ten years, so you can imagine my trepidation as I walked into the wrong terminal at Dallas Fort Worth International. Couple that with the fact that I had no idea what I was doing that I felt like a complete nervous wreck. I was sure I was going to get patted down and strip searched on the spot. So, in an attempt to thwart karma I located the nearest person that looked like they knew what they were doing and had them help me check in and get my ticket. Who knew thirty pounds would be so heavy or expensive.
My next stop: Security.
Now no one told me how security worked before Sunday. Sure, I got vague descriptions on having to take shoes off and making sure my pockets were empty and that I didn’t have hair gel in my purse. (Who uses hair gel anymore?) Really, I was so anxious that I was petrified just to have a stick of gum with me. So I think it is quite self-explanatory why I walked past the first TSA agent.
“YouWho! Miss, where are you going?” he asked.
I looked around frantically, then thought that perhaps he wasn’t talking to me since he had a wire coming out of his ear. I kept walking.
“YouWho…what are you doing?”
“Are you talking to me?”
“Who else?” (Okay, so he had a point since no one else was near us. It logically made sense he was talking to me.)
“I need to see your boarding pass. Oh! What is that perfume you are wearing? It smells delicious!“
“Oh, that’s my Exclamation perfume. Got it at Walmart.”
If I needed a pat-down, I was requesting this TSA agent.
I walked down the line, took my shoes off, went through the metal detector, and looked for my friend, Andie. Thank God the metal detector did not detect my wire bra.
Then it was time to get on the plane and take my seat. Who knew I was about to have the best conversation in my life with a seventy-two year old man. I’ve never looked out the window so many times.
That’s right–I had a two-and-a-half hour long conversation with a seventy-two-year-old man who gave me sex tips. Because as he says: “Practice makes perfect!“
Or precisely he said, “You think making love now is good now, just wait til you’re my age. You’ll have it perfected. Practice makes perfect!”
I looked out the window.
Then he proceeded to tell me all about his first time when he was fifteen with a thirty-year-old woman, how you don’t need Viagra if you’re “making love”, how I should grab my husband around his neck and bite his ear, how I need to take charge like a cougar, and how he’s been married for 51 years but was now on his way to see a girlfriend who he hadn’t seen in 44 years.
It was the best conversation ever.
I looked out the window a lot.
Then for some crazy reason I gave him my cell phone number so he could call me and ask me how things were doing at home in three weeks. I am now seriously reconsidering my mental state at the present. Anyone in Canada want to send me some thought filter pills?
I’ve never been so happy to be on the ground.
PS: I’m having fun with the Walmart references thanks to Andie and Jane. What? Don’t know what I am talking about? Then read the post scripts to Sunday I was at Wolfgang Puck.
PPS: There is no way in hell I am answering the phone when that old man calls. I may need to change my number.
Disclosure: General Motors paid for my 2.5 hour conversation with an old man on an airplane to Detroit as well as my experience with TSA agents. In case you were wondering, I did not get patted down. Andie did though.
