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amulSaturday night, Lacuna Diving Bunny and I decided to check out Frenchy's, a 24-hour adult store, for some, uh, badly-needed equipment.
As we walked back to the car, I saw a couple standing on the corner. At first I thought they were simply being intimate, but as we rounded the corner, I clearly saw that they were fighting. The guy, a bald black man in his mid-twenties, a button-down shirt hanging open to his chest, and a pair of jeans worn with the belt across his hips, that low-rider stupid gangsta style - he was pulling and cajoling her, clearly asking her to come home with him rather forcefully. The woman, primly dressed in a red sweater, thigh-length skirt of a different red (it's strange, the things I notice these days), was growing agitated as he ignored her refusals until she began shrieking "No," and clutching at newspaper vending things, struggling to free her arm as he pulled at her so hard as to jerk the vending box up on one of its edges.
LDB walked to the car, and I opened it for her with my remote, but I stood rooted to the spot, maybe fifteen feet from the scene. The guy let go of her finally, made a nasty parting comment, and crossed the street, where he stood watching her -- hoping, I presume, that she'd change her mind and go home with him. I don't understand how he could possibly think that a possibility, as she was now tightly holding onto the box and sobbing so loudly that it echoed down the street and came back to me from many directions, mixed in with the sounds of the city.
I walked up to her, until I was about three or four feet from her, and softly called out, Excuse me, miss? She spun around, off-balance from alcohol and her own wretchedness, and I could see her badly smudged makeup - thick layers of powder forming rivulets under the three colors of eyeshadow she had adorned herself with. She wore wide hoop earrings, and I now saw that her cable-knitted wool sweater had a turtleneck to it. There was deep seated fear in those ineptly decorated eyes as she asked me my business in a voice tangled thick with tears and booze.
Could my girlfriend and I give you a ride home? I asked softly, emphasizing the word girlfriend, as her date glared at me from across the street. A pair of college-aged women, whom I had been vaguely admiring only minutes earlier across an aisle of animal-shaped vibrators, passed by me and walked toward him, as the crying woman told me her car was only a block away.
Perhaps we could walk you to it, then? She shook her head once, untrusting. Is there....anything I can do, to improve your night? Again, she refused, so I sighed and walked back to the car, where LDB just clucked at me in the tone of a woman who has spent her entire life dating boys who would have acted the same as me. The college girls were yelling at the guy, asking him if his mother knew he treated women like that.
We got home and LDB wanted to test our new purchases, but I was still brooding. How can you even be interested, after that? I wanted to know. "That was out there, and now we're here," she said, trying to massage life into a part of me that has caused so many rash decisions throughout history. I had waited until the stricken woman had left the scene, and as she walked past my car, I watchfully waited until I was sure the man would not follow her.
LDB persisted, but I wasn't in the mood. I knew that my offer of aid had been meant selfishly, not out of concern for her, but from knowing that I would be like this if I did not help. Also, I was deeply aware of my hypocrisy and judgment. I had wanted to help, but waited until he had walked away. I made assumptions about her inebriation and his intentions. I presumed intentions because he was black and dressed in a manner I didn't approve of, but now realized that he may have just as easily been trying to prevent her from driving drunk.
I acted on presumptions and prejudice, and even then I had waited until he had walked away. I try to console myself by saying that, no matter his intentions, he had gone too far, had become clearly violent. I try to tell myself that, in such circumstances, presumptions are necessary, maybe even vital.
No matter how I turn it about in my head, It was selfish of me: wanting to interfere, waiting until it was safe for me to do so. Long hours have passed, while I've thought about the things that made me this way, and wondering if I like it or not.
As we walked back to the car, I saw a couple standing on the corner. At first I thought they were simply being intimate, but as we rounded the corner, I clearly saw that they were fighting. The guy, a bald black man in his mid-twenties, a button-down shirt hanging open to his chest, and a pair of jeans worn with the belt across his hips, that low-rider stupid gangsta style - he was pulling and cajoling her, clearly asking her to come home with him rather forcefully. The woman, primly dressed in a red sweater, thigh-length skirt of a different red (it's strange, the things I notice these days), was growing agitated as he ignored her refusals until she began shrieking "No," and clutching at newspaper vending things, struggling to free her arm as he pulled at her so hard as to jerk the vending box up on one of its edges.
LDB walked to the car, and I opened it for her with my remote, but I stood rooted to the spot, maybe fifteen feet from the scene. The guy let go of her finally, made a nasty parting comment, and crossed the street, where he stood watching her -- hoping, I presume, that she'd change her mind and go home with him. I don't understand how he could possibly think that a possibility, as she was now tightly holding onto the box and sobbing so loudly that it echoed down the street and came back to me from many directions, mixed in with the sounds of the city.
I walked up to her, until I was about three or four feet from her, and softly called out, Excuse me, miss? She spun around, off-balance from alcohol and her own wretchedness, and I could see her badly smudged makeup - thick layers of powder forming rivulets under the three colors of eyeshadow she had adorned herself with. She wore wide hoop earrings, and I now saw that her cable-knitted wool sweater had a turtleneck to it. There was deep seated fear in those ineptly decorated eyes as she asked me my business in a voice tangled thick with tears and booze.
Could my girlfriend and I give you a ride home? I asked softly, emphasizing the word girlfriend, as her date glared at me from across the street. A pair of college-aged women, whom I had been vaguely admiring only minutes earlier across an aisle of animal-shaped vibrators, passed by me and walked toward him, as the crying woman told me her car was only a block away.
Perhaps we could walk you to it, then? She shook her head once, untrusting. Is there....anything I can do, to improve your night? Again, she refused, so I sighed and walked back to the car, where LDB just clucked at me in the tone of a woman who has spent her entire life dating boys who would have acted the same as me. The college girls were yelling at the guy, asking him if his mother knew he treated women like that.
We got home and LDB wanted to test our new purchases, but I was still brooding. How can you even be interested, after that? I wanted to know. "That was out there, and now we're here," she said, trying to massage life into a part of me that has caused so many rash decisions throughout history. I had waited until the stricken woman had left the scene, and as she walked past my car, I watchfully waited until I was sure the man would not follow her.
LDB persisted, but I wasn't in the mood. I knew that my offer of aid had been meant selfishly, not out of concern for her, but from knowing that I would be like this if I did not help. Also, I was deeply aware of my hypocrisy and judgment. I had wanted to help, but waited until he had walked away. I made assumptions about her inebriation and his intentions. I presumed intentions because he was black and dressed in a manner I didn't approve of, but now realized that he may have just as easily been trying to prevent her from driving drunk.
I acted on presumptions and prejudice, and even then I had waited until he had walked away. I try to console myself by saying that, no matter his intentions, he had gone too far, had become clearly violent. I try to tell myself that, in such circumstances, presumptions are necessary, maybe even vital.
No matter how I turn it about in my head, It was selfish of me: wanting to interfere, waiting until it was safe for me to do so. Long hours have passed, while I've thought about the things that made me this way, and wondering if I like it or not.
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no subject
Date: 1 May 2007 02:40 (UTC)I guess were I in LDB's position, I would have gone up to her myself and offered to help, woman to woman, with my man on the outside as the present but distant protector. She might have responded better to a woman in her state, drunk late in the evening on the side of a road outside of an adult book store. ::shrug::
But I digress...
As for making assumptions based on dress or color, sad to say that most all of us do that. You were in an unfamiliar place with a stranger dressed completly differently from you acting in a manner that you can't relate to. Yes, he could have been trying to stop her from driving drunk, or he could have been trying to actually be violent toward her for some reason. There was no reason for you to have stepped up until he was gone unless he was actually hurting her, in my opinion. You could have gotten yourself hurt badly. I don't think there's anything selfish in being cautious and self-preservation.
no subject
Date: 1 May 2007 23:46 (UTC)This is the wide gray line that I've been treading. He was pulling and shoving her, she was off balance, she was distraught. Did he cross the line that demanded immediate intervention?
I second guess. I debate.
I still cannot determine if I like that I'm the sort of guy who acts like this.
no subject
Date: 2 May 2007 00:18 (UTC)By what you describe:
pulling and shoving her, she was off balance, she was distraught.
Faelan has done as much to me when I had drank so much that I couldn't fathom what was really going on around me. Taking on an angry, dominant personality (which he doesn't typically show on the outside) to force me to do what was best, get in the damn car and go home. No one, knowing us, would have stepped in. Someone on the outside might have, thinking he had crossed a line.
You don't know their relationship. Or even if they had one. You were outside your element and acting in the best interest of yourself, your date, and the woman in question. You may have made it worse had you stepped in earlier. For her, and for yourself.
Everyone has their threshold. Maybe yours was watching him manhandle her, knowing in the back of your mind that you might have done the same put in a certain situation, but maybe your limit was her falling to the ground, or this man hitting her. From the little I know of you, I'm sure you would have stepped in earlier had she been in any sort of physical danger. From what you've written, you were witnessing a drunken, late night issue/arguement.
I still think you were in the right, and possibly, possibly LDB was in the wrong. Maybe it comes from living in the big city...but what that girl needed was another girl offering support and help. ::shrug:: Not being ignored by the Lady while the Gentleman stepped up. She was drunk, she was scared, she...well. I'll shut up now so I don't get myself in trouble.