Cowboy Confessional

I went to Oakland’s airport last Sunday to welcome home Ricky Glass.

I don’t know Ricky. Never met him. Before Sunday I could not have picked him out of a crowd. Yet I and a few dozen other people took a couple of minutes from our day to welcome Ricky home with joyful shouts that startled bystanders near the baggage claim carousels.

See, Ricky just got back from Iraq, having done a two-year stint as a Staff Sergeant in the Air Force. Like many young men and women who were starting their adult lives, Ricky was called to duty and went where his fellow countrymen asked him to go. Many of us showed up to greet him once word of his arrival came down A Hero’s Welcome (www.aheros-welcome.org).

Aside from pride and heart felt appreciation, there was no common thread in the mob that formed at the base of the escalators in the Southwest terminal. Black folk, white folk, Hispanic folk were out in force. Some wore Bloomingdale fashion, others wore Wal Mart clearance. Idle conversations while waiting on Ricky’s plane to land exposed liberals, conservatives, and libertarians. I chatted with acquaintances who I know carried membership cards from groups as diverse as the ACLU and the NRA.

While we gathered on the sidewalk outside, two men who served in Viet Nam chatted and held American flags at the ready. Television cameramen had to part a path for another fellow — middle-aged, thin, with posture a flagpole would envy. Somehow he knew to gravitate toward the vets. Sure enough he had been in Nam as well. When the reporter jabbed a microphone in his face, he said with a resolute and slightly teary tone “Didn’t get much of a welcome when I got back. I’m making sure Ricky gets one.” The other Nammies nodded a silent “amen.”

Ricky may have seen some unexpected things in Iraq, but they may well pale to the mob scene at OAK. With a surprised smile that the airport could have used as a search light, he came to the arrival mezzanine and nearly froze. He couldn’t step off of the escalator before being surrounded by three layers of humanity, with elbow-savvy reporters in the innermost ring. Alas, they were no match for Ricky’s family who handily outnumbered the media and wrapped around Ricky like a winter’s blanket. Those of us who were meeting Ricky for the first time held back despite wanting to slap his back, offer to buy him a beer, or see just see a man that average Joes know to be a hero.

I didn’t detain Ricky any longer than a handshake takes, knowing that family, home, and getting out of his desert boots were high on his agenda. His handshake was what you would expect from a military man — strong, certain, with purpose. He looked me squarely in the eye, but might have been confused when a strange man more than double his age gripped back and said “Thank you, sir.”

The reporters and cameramen had vanished into their trucks, and Ricky was quickly swept away in a tidal pool of kin. The crowd thinned as the party ended, except for a few older men. The Viet Nam vets who had congregated before now stiffly stood at attention, watching Ricky’s parade exit the airport. Their mission had been accomplished.

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