Watch The Cockpit

I’m still waiting for that modeling check to come. Posing on a summer deck at a mansion in Wayzata for a national Target ad should pay more than you think. Perhaps it does in other cities, but in Minneapolis it pays just enough for you to get anxious for its arrival. A dollar less and you’d forget it was ever coming.

The check, the check, the check- it’s the only thing on my mind whilst driving through an oddly balmy November evening in Minneapolis. Barreling Honda down an uptown backstreet, jam packed with cars parked in every legal facet of street curb with the occasional vehicle scrunched next to a stop sign, a couple clutched close to one another made visible beneath the street light. The two didn’t hesitate with the passing of Honda and I’s incredulously loud belts, slowly dying engine, and axles heard squeaking around the world. Nope, they just went on kissin’ the hell out of each other.

Wow, when was the last time I saw two people kissing? Christ, can’t even remember. Minnesotans are pretty stiff about their public displays of affection. The entire Midwest in general can account for it, with the exception of Wisconsin & Iowa. People seem to breathe a little easier in certain parts of Wisconsin and even more so in Iowa. PDA and even lewd groping runs seamlessly thru the streets of Ames, Des Moines, and Iowa City… it’s just a quality we prude Minnesotans haven’t mastered yet or come to terms with.

Still passing by, I notice not only are there two people making out, but it’s two men. Hmm, when was the last time I was privy to witness two men make out? Honda & I make a full pass… onto wherever I was headed which clearly didn’t matter at this point. More importantly on my mind now is “when have I last seen two men make out?” Shit, I know it was at least within the past year…

Ahh, yes- I remember it now. Twas summer, coasting southward down Hennepin Ave. in uptown. Honda was in tip-top shape back then- smooth as fresh oil change, quiet as a Prius, in traffic I let my arm hang halfway out of the open window. Traffic bickered at a snails pace down the block, approaching 20-something street,  the corner of the Hennepin Ave. Spyhouse Coffeeshop and the Savoy Pizzeria, a man with a camera eagerly snapped shots of something on the opposite side of the street. Now, as I was eager to see what was being eagerly shot, I crept my head out of the window a bit while trafficked slowed on to watch. Two men in leather vests stood in front of a store called “The Cockpit” embraced in each others arms making out drastically. Whether it was for the camera, attraction, or both, it was no mistake the make out session was with a purpose. One man, clad in a studded leather vest, smothered his partner, who I couldn’t make out in wardrobe- just don’t remember it while trying to recall it. Honda & I still in stop-and-go-rolling-down-Crenshaw-style traffic made sight of a tag in the couples background. On the wall of The Cockpit, next to the entrance door was a bold lettered graffiti tag which read “FAGGOT”.

In a split second I thought to myself, “Mother of Mercy! Someone needs to alert The Cockpit and these men that some bastard has vandalized their place of business with derogatory bullshit!” Mind you I was voted “Most Gullible” my senior year in high school. I don’t catch on too quick, and am almost always the last to get a joke. Most times I laugh first, and understand later. I’ve found it makes me look less stupid in public. A split second later, I see the cameraman again. Snapping shots of the couple in full-throttle make-out session, making sure to get the tag in the background.

Very rarely are we privileged enough to witness beautiful response to ugly action in its purest moment and form. “Traffic can move as slow as it wants to today”, I thought to myself.