On Saturday night after work I found myself caught-up in the whirlwind of an influx of teenagers and a massive police presence. At first I didn't think much of it believing that a festival or some shit was happening, but as I made my way to the train groups of kids start running down the street. Like, hauling ass. Immediately I think shooter and get out of the fucking way, but I then notice a lot of kids laughing. OK, no shooter? Make my way to the train platform and begin to survey the chaos down below
The CTA suspended el service so I had to make my way to the subway. I'm fucking livid - yelling at kids and cops. I just wanted to go home. This morning I wake-up to the news that a couple of kids were injured by gunfire, various fighting, and tomfoolery. Immediately I remember walking by an Asian couple on their phone despondent about their car getting wrecked. Looked like a brick went right through their windshield.
I was a good kid but was also a little shit like most kids. Went to private school and hung with the metalheads. We got drunk, high, and tore shit up, occasionally, like the insouciant vandals we were. Never carried firepower, though, never got violent. And certainly never suspended public transportation, but now thinking about it it would've been kind of funny in that dick-teenager way of seeing the world.
It wasn't a great weekend. It saddened me. And to top it off I watched a live stream of Nonagon after I made it in, commenting on it even, thinking they were playing out-of-state when they were actually playing right down the street over in the next neighborhood
A good detail from the weekend is that I just caught an episode of
The Twilight Zone on network TV that I'd never seen:
The Rip Van Winkle Caper. What's odd is that I have the capacity to pretty much watch any TV presentation whenever I want, but there's something about
just letting it happen that appeals to me.