Remove Your Shoes and Empty Your Pockets

This is not a picture of me going through airport security, but it might as well be.

The baseball team I coach went on a little trip recently. To avoid the 13-hour bus ride to Fort Myers, Florida, we snagged a great deal on an economy airline. Being in charge of a group of thirty is challenging, i.e. meal setups, equipment bags, van rentals, and security checks.

I don’t mind taking my shoes off at the security checkpoints. But we all look funny filing through in our socks. And nowadays they randomly pull one out of every ten people or so to the side to offer them a full body makeover. My team cackled and made fun of the freshman catcher who was selected for “verification.”

When I arrived at the checkpoint, I was immediately chastised for having my laptop in my carry-on briefcase. “You should know better,” frowned one of the workers, “You look old enough to be a coach, not a player.” (Gee, thanks.) Red-faced, I removed my laptop and placed it on the little conveyor next to my smelly shoes.

“Step this way,” ordered a stone-faced security agent. “You’re our next randomly selected contestant.” Slighty embarrassed, I reverted to my sense of humor and my incessant knowledge of the movie version of “The Grinch” to ease the tension. “It’s because I’m green, isn’t it?” I said with a straight face. The agent glared a hole through me while one of my assistant coaches held back his laughter for fear of being arrested.

Apparently only the agents are allowed to express a sense of humor.

The Good Humor Man then put me through the whole body pat down and scanned me with a hand held device that looked like a paddle my ninth grade science teacher used on me when I threw a wad of paper toward the trash can in class without permission.

Fortunately I was cleared for takeoff and enjoyed an event-free flight. The nice lady next to me was a retired school principal with many interesting stories to tell. I eventually told her about my little newspaper column and offered her my business card so that she could send me an email should she want to be added to my email recipient list. She smiled and said she’d love to receive my column by email. (Just FYI, her name has yet to appear in my inbox.)

“Don’t leave anything in the airport or on the plane,” I warned my players before we left. When we got to baggage claim, I reached in the pocket where my cellphone previously rested and came up empty. With the recession, pockets aren’t as deep as they used to be and cellphones fall out much more readily.

A nearby security guard offered to check the plane and returned a few minutes later holding my lifeline. “Was it in the seat?” I asked. “No, it was in a girl’s pocket,” he replied. So they do have a sense of humor after all.

Turns out the flight attendant discovered my phone and attempted to call my last contact. It was a friend of mine in Boiling Springs but he had trouble understanding her because she was from Australia and he was from, well, Boiling Springs.

But I got my phone back. And I departed with what little pride and dignity I had left. At least The Good Humor Man let me leave with my shoes on.