a few of the pickets had been kicked out of my little white picket fence surrounding my lovely butterfly bush on the evening when the most massive destruction occurred. i was sitting out on the front roof at about 11:00 at night one lovely summer evening enjoying the night air (i've found this a refreshing experience and at the time, safer than sitting on my front steps). a friend from the suburbs was up and we were catching up on old times when a noise from the street distracted us. it sounded sort of like this:
"uuuuuuuuggggg" (shuffle shuffle) "uuuuuuggg" (shuffle shuffle)
... And so on. Peering over the edge, we saw an old man, in his sixties or
seventies, walking and stumbling down the street clutching his side and
dragging one leg behind him. We watched him take five or six steps at which
point he paused, wavered, and toppled over like a felled tree, into my
picket fence and butterfly bush. Both the fence and the bush made a terrible
snapping sound and the man lay inert on top of them like a bag of mulch.
My immediate thought was "wow, some old guy got shot in my front yard." I
was going over the best ways to tell this story to my co-workers the next
day, when but my friend, being unjaded and living in the suburbs, stood,
raised a finger in the air, and said "that old man needs our help!" and ran
down the stairs. "needs _your_ help," I thought.
I watched from the balcony in fascination as my friend rushed to the old
man's aid. Tapping him on the shoulder, he got the injured party to respond
with a drawn out "uuuggghh" and a shudder.
"can I help you sir? How can I help you?"
Then the man then said something that made so much sense ... "I'm so drunk I
can't find my house." It wasn't nearly that clear when he said it, but after
some mumbling, we got the gist of it. My friend opened the man's wallet and
found some identification -- the poor fellow was only 30 or so steps from
his house, on the east side of 46th. My friend picked him up and carried him
across the street and up some stairs. Ringing a doorbell, a woman answered
and took charge of what I assume was her husband.
The next day I repaired about 15 broken pickets on my fence, but they didn't
last much longer. The butterfly bush, despite being broken in several
places, did survive, to be crushed two years later by some demolition
equipment owned by the city.
Kc
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Wednesday, April 28, 2004 1:58 AM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: [UC] fence vandalism
It's not just curbside that this happens. I would understand if someone
accidentally walked into a small metal fence or messed it up while opening a
car door. On our block we did plant some flowers around the trees and
placed the small metal fencing on 3 sides. People either crushed or pulled
it out so they could park their bikes and chain them to the trees or dump
their trash cans in the tree area, crushing fence and plants - this was
within a day of the planting/fencing.
I tend to 3 small front gardens on a street. The flower beds are already
raised off sidewalk level. I added metal fencing as a deterrent to people
who let their dogs use the gardens as their bathroom and to just try to keep
people out. On one property, the metal fencing was ripped out and an
impromtu bar-b-que was made by dumping charcoal in the freshly planted
flowerbed. All the metal fences were trashed completely. I've now replaced
that with plastic fencing that's white and higher. I'm just keeping my
fingers crossed at this point.
What it comes down to to me is a total lack of respect for others' property
and a definite lack of common sense. Makes me wonder sometimes what their
homes must look like.
Wendy
<<application/ms-tnef>>
