From: bard@cutter.ssd.loral.com (J H Woodyatt)
Newsgroups: talk.bizarre
Subject: One of my lamer moments to date
Date: 17 Dec 92 01:03:04 GMT
Reply-To: bard@cutter.ssd.loral.com
Organization: Abiogenesis 4 Less


[No, this doesn't qualify as bizarre -- but I'm posting it anyway,
because if I don't I'm going to blow up in a most unpleasant fashion.
So don't even think of fucking with me about this.  I'm very edged
here.]

-----

So, on Saturday, Xtal and I went Christmas shopping in the City.
Mostly we were shopping for clothes to wear to her company Christmas
party.  (I got a tuxedo shirt, to go with the tuxedo -- she got a
skirt, a shirt and a tie.)  I *did* buy Christmas cards, one of which
I got scanned and posted as a GIF of myself not long ago (I'm thinking
of sending it to RP's daughter).  But, I don't want to spend any more
time boring the hell out of you with mundane opening details.

We were walking down Polk Street towards the BaRT station to ride to
Berkeley, when at Post Street we came upon a small crowd of people
standing around a man lying unconcious on the sidewalk in front of the
KFC, bleeding out of his mouth and the back of his head.

His blood had been smeared on the city trash can next to the pay phone
that an adolescent kid was using to call 911.  One of the people
standing around jabbering was an old, somewhat crazed vietnam veteran
who had put his army jacket over the man to keep him warm -- which is
what you do for someone in shock.

I checked his pulse and respiration, he didn't need CPR -- but he was
immobile and his eyes were glazed over.  Xtal brought him around and
he began gibbering incoherently.  He had been drinking, but his
incoherence seemed like it could have been from the head wound as
well.  We added our coats to help, and when he lifted his head, Xtal
put her backpack under it for a makeshift pillow.  He said his name
was John.

There was a young man on a bicycle who said that ``someone just hit
him and drove away'' before he too jumped on his bicycle and fled the
scene -- leaving no one who actually witnessed the event to describe
it to the police.

Like a complete schmed -- and I'm kicking myself every twenty seconds
over this *STILL* -- I deduced that the most likely scenario for what
happened was that he was drunk, and he got hit by a car crossing the
street and was thrown onto the sidewalk.  God, what a dunce I am.

The police and fire crew showed up first.  They started putting on the
rubber gloves and asking the man if he had been drinking.  He
stammered through bloody, broken teeth, ``Yeah, haven't you?''

I said to the cop standing next to me, ``He was unconcious a moment
ago.  He probably has a concussion.  I think he's in shock.''

The cop jeered, ``Yeah, he's in shock alright.  *Alcohol* shock.''

The man continued to gibber incoherently, and the cops laughed at him.
They seemed amused that, in his condition, he was unaware that he had
been injured and couldn't understand why he was the center of all the
attention.

The ambulance arrived and the EMT's loaded him into the ambulance on a
stretcher with his head taped down so he couldn't move.  The cops
asked me if I saw what happened.  I said no, and propagated my
probable misconception that he was a pedestrian victim of a hit and
run traffic accident.  Boy howdy, do I feel proud of that.  They
didn't ask anyone else.  I wondered if that was because I was the only
anglo male present.

Later, as I was walking away from the BaRT station in Berkeley, Xtal
and I were recalling the event, and it suddenly dawned on me that the
man had probably not been struck by a car and thrown to the sidewalk
-- his injuries would have probably been more severe if that had
happened -- and that I had been a complete fool for not thinking about
anything else besides making sure I was ready for what I'd have to do
if the guy stopped breathing.

I remembered being at the Maritime Academy and hearing the joke about
Polk Street countless times.  I won't repeat it.  I remember what the
guy looked like and where he was, and it occured to me that the most
likely explanation for what happened is precisely what the guy on the
bicycle said, "Somebody hit him and drove away."  Meaning:  some
troglodyte jumped out of a car, hit the guy in the mouth with a pipe
or something similar, jumped back into the car and sped away.

Random fucking violence?  No.  Because of where he was, and what he
looked like, it seems much more likely to me that he was sent to San
Francisco General with a head injury and a mouth full of broken teeth
because some thoroughly crazed yahoo -- probably a yahoo who has heard
and perhaps told that stupid joke about Polk Street -- thought he
looked like he might be gay.

I called the cops the next day to find out what I could about the
incident.  I got the brush off.  ``We're sorry, but there isn't
anybody on duty right now who knows anything about the incident, but
procedure is that we send somebody to the hospital to take a
statement.''  Turns out there were not one but three assaults on that
street corner that night.  ``This happens all the time,'' the watch
commander said.

I'm still shaken.  I have reconsidered my decision not to own a
handgun so many times since Saturday night, I've lost count.  As I'm
sure I don't need to remind anyone, there is a significant difference
between simply being aware that this shit happens, and having it
interrupt your lifestyle, and the primary difference in my mind right
now is that the question, ``What kind of loose screw would do such a
fucked up thing?'' becomes much less easily dismissed with a simple,
``It isn't important,'' when the victim of one of those loose screws
commences to bleeding on your personal effects.  (I can only imagine
that it must be another experience entirely when the victim is a loved
one, or yourself.)

I really want to know.  What kind of twisted pathological kink in the
grey matter could possibly motivate hatred so strong that clocking
some randomly selected but qualified stranger in the mouth with a pipe
seems like the right thing to do?

No.  I haven't done any Christmas shopping since.  I don't have the
stomach for it.  Someone help me.  Please.  I feel so lame.


-- 
+---------------------------+  ``I guess the government that robs its
| J H Woodyatt              |  own people earns the future it is
| bard@cutter.ssd.loral.com |  preparing for itself.''
+---------------------------+                             -- Mark Twain

P.S.	The first person to tell me I should do my Christmas shopping in
	a mall in the burbs where private security keeps shit like
	this from interrupting your consuption, gets killfiled, flamed
	and cursed with The Bad Juju, the kind you don't shake... ever.
Newsgroups: talk.bizarre