Thursday, December 30, 2010

Getting Ready

So I am sitting next to Dr. Ricky Temple in first class on a Delta flight from Atlanta to Savannah. We go back a bit. He built “Overcoming-By-Faith Church across the street from Dutch Town, a 40 something apartment complex for homeless people, and we hit it off from the first time we met at the Starfish Cafe.

I’m not quite certain what faith actually overcame in the naming of his church but Ricky is charismatic as hell, which he would likely not appreciate me saying. I want to order him a glass of wine to see is he can turn it into water. That would be impressive. I have a lot of faith in him.

He prayed the blessing at the dedication ceremony for the Dutch Town and said a lot of nice things about me. I’ve toured his church empire which took like a week. We laughed a lot during that time.

I am surprised that he is flying home at all on a commercial airline. I figured that he would just….gravitate there…like “Beam me down there Scotty” from Star Trek kind of stuff. He’s got his own cable show and all. And he is tall, much taller than most tall people. I think he’s a little taller than God. And his smile just melts others around him.

I re-think everything and order a gallon of water and ask him to change it into wine.

I am a Capitalist. There is money to be made. Even in first class.

Ricky decides that openly associating with me in front of all of these people may tarnish his stellar reputation. He begins talking church stuff to the person sitting next him. I immediately lose interest.

Staring out of the window I think back to the morning. Angela the maid burst into my room from the rain. She spit Spanish at me as though from a machine gun then she hugged me tight.

“I have no idea what you just said,” I said to the top of her head which was buried in my chest.

Her black face looked up at me with a mouth full of the whitest teeth. Rain drops were on her glasses.

“You leaving me today! You can’t leave me today! You got another week or something. Who’s doing to teach you Spanish?”

I laugh out loud with her. “Somebody back home because you’re doing a terrible job.”

“Did you get a late check out?” she asks.

“Of course not,” I tell her. “I’ll leave when you tell me to leave. Why would I bother with the people who run the place?

She laughs. “I got you. I got you.”

She hugs me tightly and tells me goodbye as she dashes off to clean another room.

I take it as a sign to make the rounds and say goodbye to the Koster family and Jack and Loretta, all friends from Canada. Carlos isn’t at work yet so I Face Book him and we promise to talk again soon. Hyler and Cass meet me back at my tiny little studio for the shared cab ride back to Princess Julia Airport. Daisy is our driver and she and I go way back. She drives the car like she just stole it.

Ricky Temple hits me on the shoulder interrupting my thoughts as professional Christians are prone to do.

“Hey media boy,” he says with his million dollar smile, “When you went out you did it with a bang! What exactly you been doing?”

I hate it when he calls me boy.

But he is my friend and I look at him looking at me as though I’m getting ready to share a secret that nobody else knows. He leans forward across the aisle in anticipation. It seemed like forever before I answered him but it was really only seconds.

I winked at him and said, “I’ve been getting ready.”

He leans back with his smile. “Oh yeah? Getting ready for what?”

“For me,” I tell him.

And we laugh.