| Shot in the Dark |
[May. 8th, 2007|11:30 am] |
We finally got out of bed about an hour ago to assess the damage. Lauren is putting together some tuna sandwiches and I am sitting on the porch after having cleared away the broken glass from our front window. I had to vacuum the couch so I could sit on it, but the whole neighborhood looks like a war zone now. My neighbors are picking up trash around their house, scrounging around for usable stuff. The cars parked in the street - a lot of them have smashed-in windows and have been flipped over, or burned. My car is completely destroyed. I don't even want to think about it. Here is what happened last night.
Around 1, Lauren and I went to sleep in my attic bedroom. So far, pretty normal. As we were drifting off to sleep we heard some gunshots, the crackle of breaking glass and a car alarm. It was finally here, we realized: the rioting was bound to happen to us. The hippies had had enough. Lauren got out of bed and looked out the window facing the street - she said she didn't see anything, but the sounds of more gunshots prompted her to come back to bed.
Brendan came running up about ten seconds later, and we could hear the sounds of people waking up downstairs. We all went downstairs to check the locks on the doors and move some furniture up against the windows and stuff. Luckily I decided to bring my bike into the basement, which Lauren had to help me with.
Within minutes there were students pouring out of houses, either engaging rioters or joining them. It was utter pandemonium. When the first crowbar hit the first car on our block, I swore: that tank of gas was for nothing! We watched helplessly from our darkened living room as the chaos spread throughout the street for what seemed like ages. It was really only probably about ten or fifteen minutes before the police arrived with tear gas. I proposed we all go up to the attic at this point, because it was less likely we'd be affected by the tear gas up there. There was more shooting - from the small window in the attic, it looked like the police were being shot at and pelted with stones. Someone was throwing Molotov cocktails, which caught a garage on fire. I was amazed at how long they stood their ground despite being antagonized like that.
It was kind of inevitable that the police would open fire at the student rioters. I wish they hadn't - but simultaneously I wish they'd done so earlier. Like I said, my car is destroyed, my front windows are all blasted in, and a couple of the rioters tried to get into our house to escape the police. There wasn't much I could do, but Brendan chased them out with a microphone stand.
The radio is saying today that four students were killed and twenty-three injured. It sure looked like there were more than that last night. Out on the street today it's eerily quiet. There is a police barricade at the intersection of my street and State Street. We were supposed to get some people together for a bike ride out to the countryside today to get some groceries, but I think we're going to have to wait. My mom just called to make sure we were all okay. She was kind of mad about the car, but there is nothing I could really do about that. I really feel like we're on our own now. |
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| Break-in |
[May. 4th, 2007|11:47 am] |
Last night was really weird. Lauren, Amy and I were over at my neighbor's house having some quality time on their patio, which is really cool, because it's actually a fenced-in bit of roof. They had busted out a couple bottles of cheap wine for the occasion! I was smoking a cigarette and looking over at my house, all the lights off to conserve energy, and I noticed something moving in the shadows on our back patio. I wasn't really sure what it was, because we do get some homeless folks coming around and looking for recyclables, so I really didn't think anything of it. Then I heard the door open.
I knew something was wrong - Brendan was at work, Alex was visiting her family back home, Irene was over at her boyfriend's house, and Amy was on the patio with us. Moreover, if someone was coming home early, they'd at least light a candle in the kitchen. I shot Amy a look, like maybe we should go check this out. I know I was a little bit tipsy and I think that Amy was a little more far-gone than I was. My neighbor Andy said he'd come with me, and he took an empty wine bottle. I wasn't sure what we'd find, but I was pretty glad Andy was coming with me.
We decided to go in loud and see if we could startle whoever was in there. I even turned on the living room light to make sure everything was well-lit and we could see everything. Nobody in the front of the house. Andy went into the kitchen first, turned on the light, and gave a shout! When I looked, there was some guy in our fridge, just eating out of it.
Now, I realize food is hard to come by, but really? We're barely scraping by as it is. Turns out the guy's apartment building turned out a bunch of its tenants because they simply couldn't make rent. His name is Tim and Andy invited him over. I was mad he ate one of the oranges I had bought as a surprise for Lauren, but he turned out to be an all right guy. I told him that if he ever needs food, he can come by and we can work out a deal. There's always a couch to sleep on, too.
Maybe it's naive of me, but I really want to trust people's good intentions. |
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