inner city interlude

I drove out to the usual study spot for my cardamom-laced coffee and fix of art-schoolers and Saudis mingling in the old Italian neighborhood. I'm working on a paper and chilling out massively, booking tickets for a trip in December but then start getting text messages Saturday night from the neighbors asking if I'm okay because someone got shot in front of my house.

well. I'm okay.

The phone calls and messages keep coming, that the street is blocked off, that someone ran up my driveway, that someone got taken away in a stretcher, that the police are all over my yard. Meanwhile, studying is not going to happen, the coffeeshop's closing in ten minutes, I'm giving a friend old lady relationship advice, and I'm glad at least I'm prepared for the chaos that's going to be there when I get home.

The street is still blocked off, there is crime scene tape in my front yard, so many cop cars, one tells me that the guy who got shot is dead, that the shooter ran off, that I can't go in my back yard because there's evidence back there so I go through the front and can't do anything but pace around because this is all just too weird, and then a friend getting off work who has no idea calls me and I tell her what's going on and say I'll drive out to see her, because I've had too much coffee and I'm not going to sleep with all this going on. The irony of driving through the sketchiest parts of the east side to see her because I don't want to be around where the crack deal went bad happened in my own yard is not lost on me. 

So evidently this is how I cope with homicides in front of my house, I eat pancakes and get morbid and then talk about other things because it takes me a few days to process things. When I come home, everyone's gone, it's like nothing ever happened. I'm still a little shellshocked and numb but strangely peaceful for reasons I can't explain other than invoking spiritual things. The songs I sing on Sunday morning beating the heck out of my guitar feel more meaningful, it's grace that's brought me safe thus far and grace will lead me home, this my glad commemoration that til now I've safely come... melt the clouds of sin and sadness drive the dark of doubt away... 

I go to the beach afterwards with my camera, to gather my thoughts and take pictures of blowing sand and autumn leaves and the debris that washes up on shore, driftwood and bones and shells. There's no one out but me and the windsurfers and I'm sure I look a little strange wandering around by myself taking pictures of dead things with homie's keffiyeh scarf wrapped around my face to keep out the blowing sand and the sunglasses I only use while driving. But I feel like being anonymous especially when I come home and am standing on my porch talking to the neighbor across the street and there are news crews on my tree lawn.

Since neither of us were home, we have nothing to say to them which is a relief and I go over to my parents' house for a family function where I refrain from spouting off political opinions and strangely enough, my folks aren't nearly as freaked out by this as I thought they would be. It wasn't like things didn't happen in our neighborhood either, but this is a whole other thing.

And no, I have no plans to move, no plans to buy a gun or a security system or a dog or whatever. I don't lose sleep over this. I grieve the loss of life and wish it didn't feel so necessary to have a guy friend walk me home from the bar at the end of the night. But I have neighbors who care about me, friends who offer me places to crash and listen to me process all this out. I may be vulnerable but I feel strong, because I've realized even more now that I'm not alone. 

 

blood and roots

A late afternoon dentist appointment led to the discovery of a nice little fistula beneath one of yours truly's molars, which meant that yesterday morning was spent in the dentist chair rather than the office chair and there's a dull little throb there now. I guess it could be worse if it continued.

It hovered between rain and sun this weekend, and I hung out with the neighbors, slacked by the lake with my parents, and ended up at a baseball game where I watched the Indians lose of course. On the way back from the islands to Fair Clevelandia, the sky was that amazing combination of dark clouds and intense sunlight and at one point I was driving beneath this rainbow that started at the highway median and arched over into the farmland on the other side. It was so beautiful and I wish I could have stopped and snapped a shot to even try to express it but it's hard to do that kind of thing when there's no place to pull over.

As the swelling and the numbness went down, I ended up in the garden most of the day, rearranging and putting in everything that I hadn't gotten to before, with an in-law of one of my neighbors, who expounded on theories involving religion, homeopathic medicine, and the current state of affairs as a giant C-O-Nspiracy ala Dave Mustaine and Alex Jones, and while I can agree to some extent that things are really messed up in this world, I found myself inevitably punching holes in said narratives about conflict between people (because I believe that the Irish would still be mad at the English and that Shia & Sunni would still be going at it whether or not the CIA existed),  because while our meddling doesn't help, people seem to do a good job finding reasons to go to war with each other on their own.

I don't think the CIA or whoever is behind everything, or that they're poisoning the water/vaccinating us to self-destruct early/whatever. I'm sure that the building I work in and the computer I sit in front of and the cell phone I own aren't doing wonders for my health, but I don't know what the point is in living forever as it is.  It's not that what's going on isn't important, it's just that there's battles I don't see the need to fight and I figure that if the state wants you gone, it's pretty evident that the constitution these folks value so highly isn't going to be one's salvation or protection.

In theory we have similar religious leanings, but I wonder where the trust in God is when it's all about ME AGAINST THE MAN or how one heals oneself or flipping out so much about the guvvermint. I remember my dad saying something similar when some of his friends were going into survivalist mode for the inevitable Clintonian Martial Law Y2K Takeover and would argue about paying taxes and such, that last time he checked, first-century Rome was some lousy overlords and that the religious folk were generally law-abiding citizens paying taxes to an imperialist state that wasn't averse to setting them on fire or throwing them to beasts, and that they didn't run off to the woods with a bunch of weapons waiting for the end to come and for everyone to get theirs. So I listen, and occasionally interject, and the theories grow increasingly more bizarre, but it is what it is, and she is generous with her plants and who am I to judge.

So we get the garden plots done, I've got kale and tomatoes, eggplants and peppers and herbs, hills of squash and rows of beans waiting to germinate, a bucket full of Jerusalem artichokes by my back porch and flowers that will go somewhere, plants that I'm sharing with other enthusiasts for digging in the earth and growing things. 

And I wish I was out there instead of here, because there's something so life affirming about it, nurturing is so addictive. I have so many other things on my mind that social interactions get awkward because I'm less concerned about saving an old building on the other side of town, or the politics of fiefdomery, isn't life more than, food, isn't the body more than clothes? Especially when there's drones laying waste to other lands and people getting shot by cops and kids can't read. I don't know, I don't know what I'm trying to say here.

best of the blotter: kids, guns, polka...

SUSPICION, ORCHARD GROVE AVENUE: A woman noticed a group of children playing in front of her home Sept. 30. She told police that one of the boys seemed to be holding a handgun.
Officers later determined it was a toy gun. They advised him and his parents about the complaint.

COMPLAINT, MADISON AVENUE: Officers spoke with a group of children who had been swearing at the park and told them to leave Sept. 29.

COMPLAINT, MADISON AVENUE: Police responded to reports of children hiding in trees and throwing acorns at passing cars. They surveyed the trees near Rosewood Park, but found no children.

COMPLAINT, THOREAU ROAD: Channeling their inner samurai, two teenagers spent the afternoon Sept. 30 running around with Japanese swords, chopping the limbs of trees.
Their games caught the attention of a nearby resident, who thought Japanese swords might be a bit dangerous.
An officer spoke with the boys and explained that they should probably pick up a new hobby, at least when on city streets.

BURGLARY, CHESTNUT DRIVE: A homeowner told police Sep. 29 somebody entered his unlocked home and stole a chainsaw and a television.

DISTURBANCE, MAPLEWOOD ROAD: Officers responded to Arbor Court apartments around 11 p.m. Dept. 21 for a report of people screaming and yelling obscenities. They told officers they were playing an intense word game. They were told to keep it down. 

EXPLOSIVES, LINDEN LANE: A woman said Sept. 24 she found a box of what she was told were training hand grenades and wanted to turn them in to be destroyed. The Suburban Police Anti-crime Network bomb squad was called to remove the grenades, which were believed to be fake, but the fuses were live.

SUSPICIOUS PERSON, MAYFIELD ROAD: A woman was seen in a car at BP around 11 a.m. Sept. 23 with a butcher knife. She told officers she was going to use it to prepare lunch after she went grocery shopping. A man who was with her, said he was not concerned for his safety but she was asked to secure the knife anyhow.

BULLETS AT BEST BUY 
Someone left bullets at Best Buy Sept. 29, a report said.
The store manager asked police to take the 9mm Rueger magazine with six bullets.
Twice in recent months, guns have been left behind in restrooms -- once in Walmart in August, and the other a week later at Panera.

Polka Party
Residents on Sassafras Drive called police about 10:30 a.m. Sept. 29 about loud polka music.
Police followed the music to a nearby home where residents were getting ready for a Serbian wedding.
The music was "extremely loud," a report said, and police advised the residents they would be cited if officers had to return.