I'm changing my blog and what it's all about. For a couple of
years now since I finished my biography, posted on this blog, I've
tried to start a regimen of writing thoughtful essays, columns as it
were on weighty subjects. I was going to write something about
Feguson. But it just seems too difficult to get started, all the
things I think about don't coalesce when I try to put them down in an
essay.
And about Feguson. When it first happened I was pretty much on
the side of the cop, though the town and local police forces didn't
do themselves any honor. More information came in and it looked
confusing. Feguson became a national cause. Did I say I'm a retired
cop – I've been there when I don't know what the suspect is going
to do, my gun drawn, and the wrong move and I'm going to fire. Yes,
to do the job, we tell ourselves it's important to be willing to be
in situations like that and we tell ourselves returning home is
important to our families and if that means making a life and death
decision quickly and then being wrong, well that's the risk of the
job.
I know cops don't go out looking for people to shoot and they
don't shoot people because of their race. But I do know that there
are some cops that make bad decisions out there. Sometimes they
don't know when to back off or they don't know how to approach a
suspect without jacking them up or getting jacked up themselves.
Maybe they stereotype too much forget that everyone is an individual.
And I know that black kids are more likely to get shot than white
kids. Feguson definitely could use some Black cops, but who voted
for an all white city council? In my opinion exercising voting
rights is the best way to protest injustice.
And then I think about the recent elections in Richmond. Because
they were off year elections turnout was low. Chevron tried to buy
the election, funding a slate of candidates favorable to their
agenda. They lost. They lost because turnout was low and the
African American precincts with majorities for the Chevron candidates
were overwhelmed by the other voters. The head of the Chevron slate
was a well known Black councilmember. In America we have democracy
and the mess that we have in Federal and state governments is what we
voted for.
So today I was driving up San Pablo Avenue and just before Miller
Drive saw the flashing lights of a fire truck in the middle of the
street, a Sheriff's car was coming up beside the traffic and it was
obvious there had been an accident at the intersection of Miller and
San Pablo, It was raining heavily. This is our second series of
storms in a few days, the roads were slick and wet, running with
water. More fire engines and paramedics were pulling up as we
crawled up the hill, two Richmond Police were coming down the hill
Code 3, lights flashing, sirens screaming.
The accident was only one car, a Volvo straddling the center
parkway, its front axle broken and the car was dented and banged up
as if it had rolled. There was a woman sitting in the driver's seat
and on the other side someone was holding an umbrella over the
passenger side. The firefighters were moving with that deliberate
slowness that indicated the situation was serious. In the distance I
could hear the wail of an ambulance on its way to the scene.
We're getting ready for Christmas, the tree is up. I've bought
gifts for Suzette and still have to buy Paloma gifts. She got a big
girl's bicycle for her birthday, so Christmas will be a nail painting
set, puzzles, and probably I'll relent and get a Barbie doll.
“How many Barbie dolls do you have?”
“Six.”
“You need another one?”
“Yes.”
Later Paloma informed us that Emily has 15 Barbie dolls. We
countered that maybe she got some of them from her older sister, a
freshman at Cal. That argument didn't impress Paloma. I think she
thought she needed an older sister who would go to Cal and leave
Barbies behind.
And I think about that Volvo and the woman in the front seat who
was probably on her way down the hill on an errand like we were
coming back from. And I think about the passenger shielded from the
rain and what their injuries might have been. How old are they? Was
it a child?
Instead of dinner and VCR recordings of Wild Kratts, the
background noise to writing this, they're probably at a hospital or
maybe worse.
Life is fragile. In a moment it can be turned upside down or even
ended. And the rest of us go on.
