Camden Coffee Company was robbed at gunpoint this morning, minutes before I got there. The new ownership has begun opening at 6:00 am; a couple of their friends alternate the early morning hours (pre-9:00), but there's not very many people that stop in before 7:30 or so-me being one of the regulars.
When I got there this morning at 6:15 (only by chance-it would have been earlier but I stopped to get cash), Chris (the guy who was working) unlocked the door to let me in. He said: "You'll never guess what just happened..." A guy had come in a few minutes earlier, pointed a gun at him, emptied the cash drawer and ordered him around the store while he searched various other places for loot. Chris was pretty freaked out-I stayed there till the cops came.
What a freaking bummer. It's not like you expect this sort of process going on in the head of the idiot-the fool-that would pull off something like this, but you just wonder how a person can not be thinking, "Hmm, what kind of neighborhood do I want to live in? Do I really want to drive the remaining few businesses away so that there's abandoned storefronts everywhere?" My theory has long held that even assholes don't want to live next door to other assholes (they would prefer to be the sole asshole), but how people can't then make the leap of logic to realize that we, in a community, are all connected-we all sink or swim together-is beyond my capacity to understand. It's things like this robbery that ultimately drives so many non-assholes to move away. What ends up left in blighted areas are poor people that can't afford to move out, and assholes; and people in more advantaged communities begin to confuse the two, and it becomes an ugly slope of flight-induced segregation.
Beyond my own home & family, the single institution I care most deeply about in my neighborhood is this coffee shop. I consider my regular and faithful patronage one of the best ways I have to contribute to my community, and I feel absolutely violated and furious. Interesting timing, too, as Sharon & I are doing our Honeymooners show there tonight. We are expecting a pretty large crowd to show, so maybe the owners can take some comfort in the solidarity. It probably wouldn't hurt if they started opening at 7:00 again, either.
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4 comments:
Mother Fuckers.
What does this do to your thinking of going to the Shire? Makes you want to flee, or does it make you want to stay out of spite?
The actual event this morning made me more resolute to stay-I feel a mixture of resolve, determination, loyalty, and sympathy.
I think the problem with most assholes is that they don't think about anything and certainly not about the consequences of their actions.
Their instinct is often far more primitive. 'Need cash now' - or maybe more likely - 'need drugs now, so cash'. It's very animal-like.
There are certainly plenty of other kinds of assholes, and the suburbs are filled with 'nice' but stupendously selfish assholes, who also don't really consider the consequences of their actions. They don't have the excuse of poverty, as thin of an excuse as theat may be, but their selfish actions lead to all sorts of bad.
As an occasional patron of the Camden Coffee Company, I express my solidarity.
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