Stock Values

Today's blog entry was going to be about soft commodities - that's the ones you can chew. Unfortunately, it will have to be about drunk driving, instead. But don't you worry, it's nothing really horrific, every human will live through the end of the story and, of course, I wasn't the one driving drunk.

In fact, I was sleeping in my bed, dreaming. Actually, these dreams were more like nightmares, something absurd about me and the mafia. I think, I was one of them, a top gun in a getaway car. So, needless to say, I woke up not feeling exceptionally well rested. I looked at the clock - it was 6:40AM, Saturday; and I didn't go to bed 'till 1AM! I went to the bathroom and after a brief stop at the ceramic throne headed back to bed. Hoping to cheer myself up with the view of the trees in the front yard - they are finally starting to look like real trees - I looked out of my office window. I had to do a double take and even pinch myself, because what I saw was just as surreal as my nightmare - a black "mafia" van, blocking my driveway. No, I was no longer dreaming.

I quickly pulled on some clothes and rushed outside with my cell phone in hand. A dog ran towards me barking. Something wasn't right. I couldn't see it from the window, but on approach it became obvious that the van was heavily damaged, pieces of it and its contents thrown all around my front yard. Lots of trash: letters (mostly unopened old collection letters is what they looked like), clothes, tools, cigarette butts, mirror and window glass broken into millions of little pieces, at least three cans of beer (later I found several more) and fresh packaging from a beer 12-pack and a 24-pack.

It didn't take long to find the "victim" of this accident either - the dog led me right to him - he was comfortably laying on his side in the Woods Rose bushes, apparently having been catapulted out of the vehicle. (Have you ever heard of seat-belts, schmuck?) I called 911 and then briefly surveyed the damage to the nearby trees. The six or seven year old apple tree, was one of the first I planted here - it was badly broken and will have to be replaced. The six year old apricot fared only slightly better, with bark stripped on all the mature limbs. More than half of a Desert False Indigo bush was decimated with roots pulled up - I can only hope that it will come back strong again next year.

I returned to the alleged tree murderer, first with a camera and then a video recorder. Seriously bruised, he was fully conscious. His first (and only) wish was that I help him sit up. I told him that I couldn't do that, that I could hurt him more than I could help him and that he would have to wait for the paramedics. He retorted that in that case he would just get up by himself and walk away. "Right, you do that... So, how many have you had?" I queried. "Oh, I just had three, but I wasn't the one driving," the man answered. He had obviously already concocted a story. Unfortunately for him it was less than consistent. First he identified his friend, the driver, by one name, then another, then he suddenly no longer knew his last name. This mysterious friend, according to the storyteller, drove the vehicle, which belonged to our "hero" and then walked of on foot after the incident.

The sheriff finally arrived, then the fireman, paramedics, state troupers and a helicopter. My new "friend" was airlifted on a chopper to a hospital. In the process I learned that this was not the man's first run in with the law and that he is a familiar face with the local law enforcement. Apparently, he has been airlifted before, as well. He shouldn't have been behind the wheel, not even if he had an insurance card and was sober, he shouldn't have had a gun with him, he shouldn't have received punishments limited to simple slaps on the wrist in the past.

Our current environment, fully backed and perhaps even fostered by our judicial, legislative, political and social system encourage us to avoid taking responsibility, to look for scapegoats. We have become a nation of wieners, constantly looking and finding someone else to blame, a source of our woes on the outside. We can't continue to do this, if we want to remain the world's top economy. We need our young and not so young men and women to stop blaming and start taking responsibly for their own actions and we are doomed until that happens.

The young man, who is the subject of this story, should have been taught his lesson from the start, early on, if not by his parents, then by the judge, who should have sent him to do meaningful community work early on, or to, perhaps, rot in jail. The local Sheriff told me that some people will never learn and that is probably true. But if we, as a society, never even make an attempt to teach our constituent members lessons, then it is us who are failing not only individually, but also collectively.

And this brings me to a point in this narrative that struck me the most. His parents, who apparently live nearby, didn't rush out to help and apologize for not being able to bring up their boy right. What they did, was sent over a "representative" to pick up the dog and save their dear son from having to pay animal control fees. I know that if it was me who had gotten himself into a situation even half this bad, my dad would have been right there, concerned, helpful and above all apologetic. But then again, my dad is of a different generation, having been born in a country that no longer exists.

No, I shouldn't have been the one stuck holding the proverbial short end of the stick - cleaning up all the broken glass, paying for new road base and replacing trees. And unless we realize the problem and make major changes, a couple decades down the road, perhaps sooner, it will be all of us stuck cleaning up the resulting mess.

P.S. Officers have asked me to withhold the identity of the alleged little prick, described in the foregoing, pending their criminal felony investigation and I'll be happy to do that. Anything to make sure that the lives of my trees are the last ones that he allegedly or otherwise takes.