Funny you should ask… Earlier this afternoon before dinner, I was rolling towards my residence when I was intercepted by an officer with our local RCMP ( for non-Canadians, this is our federal police force, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police ).
As I’m sixty years old, and handicapped but in an electric wheelchair, I was travelling against the traffic in a bike lane. Careening into my lane and blocking the traffic behind his lights-flashing cruiser, he lurched to a shuddering halt and opened his car door. He stomped quickly towards me with steely blue eyes pooping with venom and actually yelled, “Who the hell do you think you ARE?!!! using the bike lane…” You can imagine how targeted and scared witless I was now. I apologized and said that I thought wheelchair users were permitted to use those lanes, because I see people like me using them every day of the week! The constable wasn’t having any of it, and was shaking with rage at the effrontery he had to deal with. Imagine, a vulnerable citizen asking for clarity on the matter at hand… “I’M TELLING YOU, BUD, YOU’RE GONNA TURN AROUND RIGHT NOW AND GET YOURSELF AND YOUR BLOODY CHAIR ON THE SIDEWALK!!! I objected and pleaded with him, “But officer, the lane that I was about to turn left on to get me home for supper is only about 25 metres away. Can’t you just let me go ahead and promise to check into the bike lane protocols. I assumed I was going about things right because I’ve seen, as I’m sure you have, wheelchair folks doing what I’m doing ALL THE TIME…” At this point the fascist-goon was going apesh*t, and jabbing his immaculately manicured forefinger towards my chest, and now I was actually frightened that I may have pushed back too far.
While all this was about to go down, I was on speakerphone with my older brother Harry in Winnipeg, and he heard the entire encounter. After doing as I was commanded and safely in the lane that I needed to get to, I was completely outraged at how defenceless I was, how vulnerable I was to harm, at the hands of a peace officer. My brother, an academic who has taught graduate courses in Sociology and Political Science warned me to suck it up, when I vented and swore bitterly that I would lodge a complaint with the Sonderkommandant at the local RCMP detachment. He said, “Don’t even THINK of it! Guys like you, good looking, smart and, worst of all, are resented by fascists like that. There’s no explanation for that, and you know better than that, and it’s not the first time that you’ve given fascists like that a hard time… If you think you’ve just been targeted, well… you HAVE. But it’s gonna be a helluva lot worse if you go ahead with what you’ve proposed here. You ALWAYS HAVE TO REMEMBER: THOSE DUDES DO WHAT THEY DO, not all of them, but far too many, because they’re insecure assh*les who need the less fortunate to lord over and hassle… When they’re on their own in their cruisers and they have a pretext to mess with you, they WILL! And don’t forget about the thin red line, right. It’s real, man. You’ll be a target from here on in, because you’re all over town and the guy’s not going to forget you…” I took his advice. I’m sucking it up, and I’m keeping my head down. Way too many people like me gets their butts kick or even become fatal statistics by professional perps who never seem to get indicted and justifiably incarcerated for their criminal brutalities. Reader beware… rumour has it that in your fine country, their exists a Prison Industrial Complex with a LOT of detention centres busting at the seams with not a lot of able-bodied white folks in their cramped, unventilated; and their relying upon public and private goon squads to keep their concentration camps FULL OF FOLKS LIKE US to ensure huge returns from the same shareholders and angel investors who are about to shoehorn The Orange Man into a second term. So, yeah, this experience aligns nicely with Ms. Colleen’s request, I think… I pray to G-D, that She will protect us as much as She will be able to, in the New Order that seems to be coming at us with the speed of a runaway train. Please be safe. Life is too precious to squander when confronted by the Powers and Principalities that are currently in ascendance. Speak Truth to power, if you are brave enough to; but don’t react impulsively. Learn the tough lesson, to control yourself and tread lightly around the serpents on the path ahead.
Oh my goodness? In my outrage I dropped words, forgot to proofread before sending, and maybe worse still, I called our friend Phyllis COLLEEN!!! Sheesh… no doubt I deserve a proper application of a cat-I-nine-tales for that. But, having only the briefest of experiences with her, I suspect she’s forgiven me already. Thanks, PHYLLIS. :)
Many years ago I took a Kabbalah course & came away with a learning that stayed with me, which helps me in interactions with all sorts of people….that being “be proactive rather than reactive”. Not to say that I am always totally without initial reactivity :))
There is much to learn in these interactions I find & , thanks to the kindness consciousness my time as a member of the KindSpring community has gifted me, my compassion/empathy comes into play.
We were in a store when a person started spouting forth his political views about a certain politician that triggers reactivity in me…I find becoming the “observer” helps me calm myself.
We are living in a very difficult time right now….so many people are divided, angry, on edge, high reactivity, etc.
I shared today’s Raft & my comment to a friend. This was her comment back to me:
“The benefit of that learning brings peace to us along our journey because the challenges are always coming up. When we can, it becomes a powerful tool to diffuse ourselves and not fuel the fire. “🙏
Leanin’ on the side of humility. I’m blessed to been awarded the rank of Professor Emeritus in Mathematics from Miami Dade College (Miami, FL; Kendall Campus). My love of mathematics and the passion/call to teach it for thirty-five years (three states, three levels) originated with THREE gifted, FEMALE math teachers - Miss Cohen (Springfield Gardens Junior HS 59; Queens, NY) and Mrs. Katz & Mrs. Schwager (HS of Performing Arts; New York, NY).
Funny you should ask… Earlier this afternoon before dinner, I was rolling towards my residence when I was intercepted by an officer with our local RCMP ( for non-Canadians, this is our federal police force, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police ).
As I’m sixty years old, and handicapped but in an electric wheelchair, I was travelling against the traffic in a bike lane. Careening into my lane and blocking the traffic behind his lights-flashing cruiser, he lurched to a shuddering halt and opened his car door. He stomped quickly towards me with steely blue eyes pooping with venom and actually yelled, “Who the hell do you think you ARE?!!! using the bike lane…” You can imagine how targeted and scared witless I was now. I apologized and said that I thought wheelchair users were permitted to use those lanes, because I see people like me using them every day of the week! The constable wasn’t having any of it, and was shaking with rage at the effrontery he had to deal with. Imagine, a vulnerable citizen asking for clarity on the matter at hand… “I’M TELLING YOU, BUD, YOU’RE GONNA TURN AROUND RIGHT NOW AND GET YOURSELF AND YOUR BLOODY CHAIR ON THE SIDEWALK!!! I objected and pleaded with him, “But officer, the lane that I was about to turn left on to get me home for supper is only about 25 metres away. Can’t you just let me go ahead and promise to check into the bike lane protocols. I assumed I was going about things right because I’ve seen, as I’m sure you have, wheelchair folks doing what I’m doing ALL THE TIME…” At this point the fascist-goon was going apesh*t, and jabbing his immaculately manicured forefinger towards my chest, and now I was actually frightened that I may have pushed back too far.
While all this was about to go down, I was on speakerphone with my older brother Harry in Winnipeg, and he heard the entire encounter. After doing as I was commanded and safely in the lane that I needed to get to, I was completely outraged at how defenceless I was, how vulnerable I was to harm, at the hands of a peace officer. My brother, an academic who has taught graduate courses in Sociology and Political Science warned me to suck it up, when I vented and swore bitterly that I would lodge a complaint with the Sonderkommandant at the local RCMP detachment. He said, “Don’t even THINK of it! Guys like you, good looking, smart and, worst of all, are resented by fascists like that. There’s no explanation for that, and you know better than that, and it’s not the first time that you’ve given fascists like that a hard time… If you think you’ve just been targeted, well… you HAVE. But it’s gonna be a helluva lot worse if you go ahead with what you’ve proposed here. You ALWAYS HAVE TO REMEMBER: THOSE DUDES DO WHAT THEY DO, not all of them, but far too many, because they’re insecure assh*les who need the less fortunate to lord over and hassle… When they’re on their own in their cruisers and they have a pretext to mess with you, they WILL! And don’t forget about the thin red line, right. It’s real, man. You’ll be a target from here on in, because you’re all over town and the guy’s not going to forget you…” I took his advice. I’m sucking it up, and I’m keeping my head down. Way too many people like me gets their butts kick or even become fatal statistics by professional perps who never seem to get indicted and justifiably incarcerated for their criminal brutalities. Reader beware… rumour has it that in your fine country, their exists a Prison Industrial Complex with a LOT of detention centres busting at the seams with not a lot of able-bodied white folks in their cramped, unventilated; and their relying upon public and private goon squads to keep their concentration camps FULL OF FOLKS LIKE US to ensure huge returns from the same shareholders and angel investors who are about to shoehorn The Orange Man into a second term. So, yeah, this experience aligns nicely with Ms. Colleen’s request, I think… I pray to G-D, that She will protect us as much as She will be able to, in the New Order that seems to be coming at us with the speed of a runaway train. Please be safe. Life is too precious to squander when confronted by the Powers and Principalities that are currently in ascendance. Speak Truth to power, if you are brave enough to; but don’t react impulsively. Learn the tough lesson, to control yourself and tread lightly around the serpents on the path ahead.
Oh my goodness? In my outrage I dropped words, forgot to proofread before sending, and maybe worse still, I called our friend Phyllis COLLEEN!!! Sheesh… no doubt I deserve a proper application of a cat-I-nine-tales for that. But, having only the briefest of experiences with her, I suspect she’s forgiven me already. Thanks, PHYLLIS. :)
Many years ago I took a Kabbalah course & came away with a learning that stayed with me, which helps me in interactions with all sorts of people….that being “be proactive rather than reactive”. Not to say that I am always totally without initial reactivity :))
There is much to learn in these interactions I find & , thanks to the kindness consciousness my time as a member of the KindSpring community has gifted me, my compassion/empathy comes into play.
We were in a store when a person started spouting forth his political views about a certain politician that triggers reactivity in me…I find becoming the “observer” helps me calm myself.
We are living in a very difficult time right now….so many people are divided, angry, on edge, high reactivity, etc.
I shared today’s Raft & my comment to a friend. This was her comment back to me:
“The benefit of that learning brings peace to us along our journey because the challenges are always coming up. When we can, it becomes a powerful tool to diffuse ourselves and not fuel the fire. “🙏
As an African American, Professor Emeritus, Mathematics, every day!
Leanin’ on the side of humility. I’m blessed to been awarded the rank of Professor Emeritus in Mathematics from Miami Dade College (Miami, FL; Kendall Campus). My love of mathematics and the passion/call to teach it for thirty-five years (three states, three levels) originated with THREE gifted, FEMALE math teachers - Miss Cohen (Springfield Gardens Junior HS 59; Queens, NY) and Mrs. Katz & Mrs. Schwager (HS of Performing Arts; New York, NY).
I'd like to think this was the case. Math teachers get a bad rap.