theology&geometry

Sometimes you happen to be in the right/wrong place at the right/wrong time, and you see weird stuff go down.

Tonight after work, I drove out to the gym. As I pulled in the parking lot, I saw a guy sort of standing around a truck. Didn’t think much of it. People stand around sometimes. But as I was gathering up my bags and getting ready to get out of the car, I noticed a woman on her cell phone close to the awning, looking back out at the lot. She looked at me and said, “You better lock your car! A man just tried to break in to mine!”

I clicked my little honk-honk remote and listened to her phone conversation as I turned to survey the parking lot. She was talking to the police, most likely, and describing what was happening. I saw the lingering dude step out from behind the truck and the lady goes, “There he is! He’s still here!” The guy was looking at us, and even from as far away as we were (two parking-lot rows), I could tell he was crazed. Just not focused but with a twitch of desperation in every movement he made. I’m pretty sure I saw him try to lift the handle of a big black Ford F-150, to no avail. He was wearing a yellow shirt. I almost want to say it was a camouflage yellow, but I can’t be sure. It was certainly a mottled pattern and not a solid. I stood there with the lady, listening to her describe the man to the police, and wondered if I should go inside and tell the front desk or wait with her or what. Classic case of What-the-fuck-do-I-do-itis.

Finally the dude slinked around to this turquoise-colored Saturn CS2 (if my Google-fu is strong), tried the driver-side door, and blammo! It opened. He got in, started it, shifted into reverse, SMACKED IN TO THE BIG BLACK FORD F-150 HE HAD JUST TRIED TO GET INTO, and drove away, all while the lady on the phone ran after him to get his plates. Luckily, another guy had just parked and gotten out of his car, and was able to catch a glimpse of the tags.

I went inside and told the front desk guy what had happened, and that someone’s truck had been plowed in to. It took him a minute to get on top of things, but he finally did. I got changed and worked out and when I came back outside, there were police cars, and I saw the owner of the truck filling out paperwork on a clipboard. That’s gotta suck real bad.

Anyway. I have no idea if the crazy man took off in his own car (how likely would that be?) or if he lifted a car with keys in it (how stupid would that person feel?), but I sure hope they’re able to find him and give him a stern talkin’ to.

Last night I was in line at Kimbrough, bottle of cheap bubbly in hand, waiting on the guy in front of me to get done with his transaction, when said dude turned to me and asked what I was getting.

I held up the bottle so he could see the label.

“Is it good?” he asked.

I nodded in the affirmative. “It’s good and cheap,” I said. (Barefoot Bubbly, woo!)

“Yeah, I need something to help me get off the vodka.”

I glanced at his purchase and, sure enough, saw that it was a bottle of cheap vodka. “Well, this would probably make a real good transition,” I offered.

The other clerk freed up his register and called me over. I checked out and headed out to my car, and heard vodka dude behind me, trying to get my attention.

I braced myself for the parking-lot pitch, which, once you’ve lived in Midtown long enough, you’re quite used to. “Yeah?”

He looked me in the eye. “Can I hook up wicha?”

Having never been propositioned so directly … in a liquor-store parking lot … by a stranger … I was a little taken aback. “Um? No? No, sorry.” I smiled sheepishly.

“No? Awww. You got a boyfriend?”

“Yeeeeeaaaaaah. Yep. Yes! Sure do. Sorry!” Another sheepish grin, this time with a twinge of guilt for lying, or at least not coming up with a better lie, like, Actually, I’m only attracted to strange men who drink bottom-shelf tequila, and I prefer to meet them on Craigslist, not at the liquor store. And also? It’s “MAY I hook up wicha?”!!!

“Damn, baby!”

[If you saw me in meatspace last night, chances are I already told you this story AND the punchline. You're welcome.]

Last night I sat on a comfy red couch with my pals Amy and Amanda and talked about all the hilarious things that had been yelled to us by people on the street during our times in cities. Amy shared stories about the leering/catcalling street folk Downtown, and Amanda told us about the time the ubiquitous aggressive white lady (you can see her from Downtown to East Memphis, if you pay attention) tried to get money from her and her hubs, Brandon, but they said sorry and then tried to back out of Midtown Video, onto Union, and aggressive white lady yelled at them, “PLEASE CRASH!!!”

All this reminded me of the time Amber was in San Francisco and received some of the best heckling I’ve ever heard. My brain is made of Nerf material, so I’ve forgotten many of the specifics, but I believe there was a shining, clear moment in which a San Francisco street-dweller looked Amber up and down and proclaimed, loudly, “BITCH, YOU CAN’T DRESS!”

I’ve had my own run-ins with Teh Crazy here in Midtown. One time I was getting gas at the On The Run (I think it was a Tigermarket/mart at the time) on McLean/Poplar and this dude with a bleeding headwound stumbled up to me and announced that I shouldn’t be afraid because he just had HIV. Another time at another gas station on Union, I was getting panhandled by some dude who said he was trying to get money to get back to Hardin County (nice try, sucka; I know you looked at my plates), and then someone else sauntered up and started panhandling my panhandler. It was pretty heavy. And, I’ve seen, many many many times, people just standing around, yelling at themselves or the sky or maybe their invisible Bluetooth earpieces. (I can’t find the damn posts or I’d just link them. Archive search fail.)

I don’t necessarily enjoy being accosted on the street by random weirdos, but I do generally enjoy the stories I get out of the experience. I really love how some people in Memphis are so hung up on our panhandling problem, as if it’s worse here than anywhere else. (I’m sure someone will swoop down into the comments to give me the business about why this is true; save it, kids, because I don’t really care.) I just halfway figure it’s something that comes with the territory of city life. Shit, I was in Chattanooga for 24 hours and we got panhandled four times. No one should have to deal with aggressive intimidation or fear of harm, of course, but at the same time, you have to expect that if you’re out in public, you might have to interact with people, and maybe even people who might ask you for things. Blah blah equivocatingcakes.

Last night as I was walking home from Dave and Amy’s at midnightish, not four hours after the conversation about aggressive white lady, I saw her coming toward me, pushing a shopping cart. I always get a little weird about meeting people on the sidewalk. My impulse is to smile and say hello, but you never know when a nod or a smile is going to open up a confrontation of sorts, and at midnight when you’re walking home alone, confrontation is not what you want. But, chuckling to myself at the weird timing, I decided I’d at least say hi in passing.

I did so, and she reciprocated and I thought that was that, until I got ten steps away from her and she turned and yelled, “HEY, DO YOU WORK AT THE LIBRARY?”

I half turned and said, “No!” and kept walking.

She wasn’t done with me. “WELL, I SEEN YOU SOMEWHERE!”

Yes, lady, I know. That’s why you’re ubiquitous.

Remember this story? Well, the documentary is finally available.

Here’s a clip (damn thing busted my frames!):

Online Videos by Veoh.com

“I immediately knew that this was just going to explode.” — Nick Fowler, famous journalist, former Sidelines editor, former MTSU Homecoming King candidate

Download it from Veoh or see the whole thing here. It’s 45 minutes long, but it’s fascinating. It’s hilarious in parts (“the wilds of rural Tennessee!”) and brilliant in others, and also very, very sad.

What stands out to me is how open-minded many of the people are, especially the people who have worked with Ericka in the past. People in small towns get a bad rap for being closed-minded, but it’s not always the case that they are…

If the crack that you recently smoked is seeping out of your widened, red, wet eyes so that I can spot you from across the room and know instantly that you’re a crackhead who’s about to say something to me, even if it’s as lovely as, “You got a name to go with that pretty face?” do not be surprised if I laugh, embarrassed, and say, “Ha, no!” because I am merely standing there debating giving you my real name. And while I am 80 percent set on telling you I am Jo Ann, I keep quiet while you tell me, rather awkwardly, that your name is [name withheld to protect the drug addled] and that you “hope we can meet again at some other more opportune time.” Which, when you’re a crackhead, probably means in the parking lot while I’m fumbling for my keys (thankfully that did not happen).

Days like today remind me why it’s so hard for me to leave the house sometimes. I had to make rounds and pick up gifts for Phil’s mom, sister and brother, which landed my in Pier One, Hobby Lobby and Target. Good lord. Scores of shoppers with that glazed look of disbelief and confusion everywhere. Cars aggressively vying for parking spots. Annoying children putting their grimy hands on everything they can possibly reach. Oddly enough, my excursion took about an hour. When I’m a woman on a mission, I can get things done real quicklike.

I had an odd encounter with a fellow human being (?) at the gas station. I’m innocently and silently monitoring the pump as I watch my money dwindle away, when I catch a glimpse out of the corner of my eye of a man cleaning the pump off, eyeing me. So then he comes over to me and asks me how my day is going. Fine; yours? A generally rhetorical question, right, but he launches into some discussion of how lucky he is to be alive because back in 1974 his skull was crushed by a big truck and he had to have the thing reconstructed with a metal plate.

But he can’t get disability because he’s a caucasian male, which is, according to him, the biggest handicap of all. So he’s taking his case to the Supreme Court and suing for $1 million or something. I don’t know. I tuned out by this time because he was totally invading my personal space, and I kept trying to move back but was pinned by my car. By this time, our conversation is nearing five minutes. Ick, what a feeling. His eyes were completely screwed up — not on a linear plane at all. So as I am silently freaking out, he non sequiturs and tells me a blonde joke. And then another. And then, I’m like, “Uh, I should really go pay.” And then he tells me the one about the five blondes lined up being a wind tunnel. And I run screaming inside. OK, maybe not audibly.

But I get inside and there’s some other crazy guy arguing with a flustered clerk about losing his car wash token and wanting another one. So I try to sneak around their fight and pay for my Cokes and my gas. But it has just now, as of this writing, dawned on me that she didn’t ring up my gas and neither of us noticed. Perhaps we were both distracted by the crazy men that seem to make things infinitely more complicated.

So that’s what I get for venturing into the world. I think I’m done with my xmas shopping. I didn’t buy anything for either of my grandmothers, though. I think I might do that on xmas eve morning, as I will be in Jackson with my dad and possibly the rest of my tribe. Dad has an MRI that morning and then we’re going to see LOTR. Maybe we can sashay by somewhere they sell grandmother gifts.

I’m excited to give my nephews their gifts. I put together an art kit for Casey, who has told me for months now that he wants to be an artist. I got him a big carrying case/portfolio, some oil pastels, sketch paper, watercolors, and neat markers. I want to encourage his creative endeavors. I can remember a birthday one year that my grandmother bought me a ton of art supplies. That was an awesome gift, and I’ll never forget it.