On instant American alliances

Midtown Manhattan at sundown, June 20Several soldiers were among the standbys for a mid-morning flight from Dallas to Little Rock on Thursday, and a tall, broad young National Guard call-up wound up sitting next to me in the ninth row.

“Sir, I just want to apologize upfront,” he told me. “I haven’t had a shower in four days, and I smell.”

I told him I’d been traveling myself, and that I hadn’t had a shower in a couple of days either: “Between us, we’ve got almost a week’s worth of stink.” I asked him where he was coming from and where he was headed. Afghanistan was the point of origin, and Little Rock, home, was the destination. Seven months he’d been gone. “I can’t wait to get laid,” he said.

He turned up his iPod, and all I could hear of the music was a rolling-thunder drum attack that sounded like Scandinavian death metal on meth. I pulled my hat down over my eyes and was asleep at the window before we even left the ground. A few minutes before we landed, I came to, slid up the shade and watched us soar low over the Arkansas River and then touch down. As much as Little Rock lacks, home remains home, and I thought how fine it must feel for my fellow flyer after having been at war for the better part of a year.

The flight attendant took to the intercom, reminding everyone that we were now free to use our cell phones, and thanking us for flying American Airlines, “part of the Oneworld alliance.”

The solider stiffened. “One World Alliance?” he said. “What’s that?”

I explained that it’s a consortium that lets people use their frequent flyer miles among different airlines. “I admit, it does sound kind of ominous,” I said.

“Yeah,” he replied. “‘One World Alliance.’ Like someone else I’ll have to fight.”