Our small neighborhood
has seen it in recent years: an alleged vampyre murdered by a professed
werewolf . . . and now a racist driving a pickup flaunting a Confederate flag.
I called the Police Department
but the Dispatcher insisted it was the driver’s First Amendment Rights: “ . . .
there are a lot of Mexicans who live here and they fly the Mexican flag . . .”
Oh My!
Sometimes one wishes things like
these were only fictitious or deranged fantasies.
I corrected the Dispatcher and
reminded her that Mexico is an established sovereign Nation, Confederacists . .
. were not (no foreign country ever established diplomatic relations with the
South).
Being a small neighborhood my partner
and I walked to the grocerystore. We passed the offensive truck parked on the
public thoroughfare, it drove past us at West Mall and El Camino Real, and
again as we were almost home.
It parked as we passed.
My partner asked, “What’s with
the flag?”
The driver replied with a
soundbite fitting the talking heads at FOX, “It’s heritage, not hate.”
We chorused, “It’s hate!”
The young man who exited the
passenger side clutching two 40s of malt liquor replied, “What they taught us was
false . . ."
I asked, “Who are they?”
He replied he looked it up.
I can imagine he used the Internet
where you can find almost everything you want to find, and deranged fantasies.
Our exchange was interrupted by a
woman who, standing before their attached garage, agape, stuffed helter skelter
with boxes and sundry items yelled, “Do not engage. Do not engage. It’s
ignorance.”
“Yes,” I yelled back, “is it
ignorance.”
I find it curious, however, and blameful, she cried
do not engage while flaunting a Confederate flag.
1245, Wednesday,
8 7. 15
