A Sidewalk Feature Takes Me Back

 When Anitra and I walk home from the Real Change office, we regularly meet this, one of my favorite Seattle landmarks. That's the headquarters of the Seattle Fire Department, viewed from the Main St side, looking east toward Second Avenue. From this angle it looks like a joke. Someone decided to split the sidewalk into a high sidewalk and a low sidewalk. So, for fun, when we approach I like to nudge Anitra toward one or the other. Say I nudge her to the high sidewalk. Then I take the other one at the last minute. And see if she breaks into an impromptu travesty of Loch Lomond.

If we look at it from further out, we realize that it's really a wheelchair-ramp to an unmarked blue-green door of the Fire Department.

It happens I remember that the door used to be marked as the entrance to a public restroom, that is now no longer accessible. I always find it locked now. But that's not the triggered memory that I'm talking about in the title. The game I play with Anitra reminds me of an obsession I had when I was 6 or 7 years old

I was caught up with the idea that I had a trajectory. As a body in motion I leave a track. If I pass through an opening, and then later, upon return, choose not to pass through that opening in the reverse direction, then I have wound my trajectory around one side of that opening. In the case of the wheel-chair ramp, if I take the high side going east, and take the low side coming back west, altogether I will have wound my trajectory once counter-clockwise around the railing.

Imagine I was leaving a string behind me, everywhere.  One long, long, string, like the drag line of spider, all the way back to the hospital room in Greenville General where I was born, where it would be anchored. Every time I were to wind it around an obstacle, it would be that much harder to pull the string straight, if I ever wanted to.

That's exactly what I imagined when I was 6 or 7, and it horrified me then, that I might be in that fix. Not to be able to straighten out my life path! It would be like being caught in a trap, ready to be devoured by some monster. I wouldn't be able to run freely, my string radiating freely, pivoting around South Carolina.

Fifteen years later I was an undergraduate discovering my own personal proof of the Fundamental Theorem of Algebra (which says that complex polynomials factor completely) and my proof ended up being the winding number proof. It's an approach that derives the theorem by studying the way polynomials map circles in the complex plane to curves, with particular attention to the number of times the curves wind around zero. Discovering that proof drew me further into the mathematics of properties of space that stay the same when you straighten wrinkles, and so I ended up being a topologist. But my original fascination with the subject was rooted in fear of being trapped in a tangle.

I'm now utterly over that childhood fear. I still imagine the drag line behind my life trajectory. The difference is now I love the tangles. Now I deliberately wind myself around things. If you see me walking down the street and I weave first right then left around various sidewalk signs, light posts, and such, you'll know that's what I'm doing. I'm tangling myself in everything, because I've figured out who the monster is, and I'm quite happy with being devoured by her.

It's Too Hot II

It was way too hot when I got home at 6 this evening, so I took the new used camera for a walk outdoors. It occurs to me that when I talk about the apartments I live in or life in downtown Seattle, one or two of you may have no idea what that looks like.

I hate living at the Union for the noise and the patronizing management, but I love it for the location. The Pioneer Square District in Seattle is a great place to look at and walk around. And contrary to what people who don't live here think, it's not all that dangerous. I feel much safer here than in condo-ridden Belltown.

I started the walk out back of my home, the Union Hotel Apartments. This is the view from 4th and S Washington. The Union Hotel garden, all 70 or so square feet of it, is the tiny bit of greenery the other side of the fence to the right of the bus shelter.

Here's the same bit of garden viewed from the south looking northwest from 4th Avenue S, showing how the garden is a foot or two from a precipice dropping to the railroad tracks leading to the Seattle railroad tunnel.

It was so hot I went to the water. This was shot 3 blocks west of the Union Hotel at 1st and S Washington, looking north along the east side of the street. When I was last homeless the sign advertising rooms for 75 cents was hard to take, knowing that it's just an antique. If there really were rooms for 75 cents a night, I wouldn't have been homeless.

I love alleys. And look: someone's art perpetually looks on this one. Between 1st and Alaska at Washington, looking south.

I spent some time at the Washington Street Waterfront Park, then moved a block north to Yesler and headed back east.

Creative use of wall space at Alaska and Yesler.

Gentrified saloons, saloons turned into fancy restaurants, saloons turned into sports bars, saloons turned into art galleries, and then, sometimes, saloons turned into saloons...

Not a half block further, a mural decorating the beautiful southern entrance to Post Alley from Yesler.

At 1st I jogged over to Cherry so that I could get a shot of my favorite building adornments.

Then south on 3rd to get a view of the Morrison Hotel, another subsidized apartment building run by the Downtown Emergency Service Center. Fellow editorial committee member Stan lives here. It also houses the DESC shelter on one floor.

Back home, I prepare to ascend my throne, the red chair, with My Blue Friend behind me.

Vigilante, Or What?

I got home tonight after 7 PM, and got ready to make a loaf of bread. I've been making a small loaf of bread every day lately, and remembered I was out of yeast. I thought of trying to use the sourdough starter again, but I didn't want to do that much work. So the next option was to go look for yeast in a neighborhood market. I decided to give SaveWay a shot.

SaveWay (not Safeway, the "v" isn't a typo) is technically a Mom & Pop store in Pioneer Square, but it's twice as big as the average Mom & Pop store, so I thought there was a chance yeast could be found there. I'd found flour and cornmeal and baking powder there before. Why not yeast?

It was already dark when I went out. It was close to 8. I don't like going to SaveWay at dark. In spite of its reputation Pioneer Square is not as dangerous after dark as Belltown or Capitol Hill, but I don't like to take chances. I was nervous and keeping an eye out for trouble.

The store is about two and a half blocks from my building. I went in and went straight for the aisle I'd seen the flour in. No yeast. I looked around in all the other aisles. No yeast. I thought maybe I could buy something else I need, so this won't be a totally wasted trip. I saw a huge 7 dollar jar of parmesan cheese that would be a good bargain. I started to take it to the counter, then I thought, I can't really spend $7 right now. I'd need to go to the bank first. So I put the parmesan back. Then I went to the aisle that had the bread. I didn't want any of their horrible bread (there's one reason I want to make my own) but my eye caught the honey. I didn't need any honey but I picked up a jar to see the price, to see if it was cheaper what I'd just seen at Bartell's. It wasn't. I put the honey back.

I wanted to ask the cashier, who happened to the "Mom" of the Mom & Pop, who would have recognized me as a regular, if she had any yeast in the store. But there was a long line, and I didn't want to risk starting an argument with the other customers by appearing to butt in with a question. I decided to just write off the whole trip as a dud. I'd go home, forget about making bread tonight, cook a couple of potatoes instead, and make a note to myself to never go looking for yeast at SaveWay again.

I walked out the door and got about 5 steps away when I heard someone behind me shout, "Hey, you! Come here! I want to talk to you!" It was a guy I'd never seen before. I've been going to SaveWay once or twice a week for ten years, ever since I moved into the Union in November 1997. This guy didn't look like any of the many employees. He wasn't wearing a security guard's uniform.

So I thought I was about to be robbed. I backed away and he moved toward me. I wanted to run back into the store, but he was in the way, so I screamed, "NO!" and ran toward Washington Street, hoping that there'd be witnesses there who would help or call for help. As I ran, I screamed, "LEAVE ME ALONE." I tried to make as much noise as possible, hoping that the people in the store would come out to see what was happening.

I knew I couldn't outrun him. I'm 58. This guy looked to me in his 30s. He caught me just before I got to Washington and swung me down into the street. He pushed me down onto my knees in the gutter in front of a car. He pinned me down and said, "What did you take?! Show me what you took!"

So I thought now he was a thief who thought he saw me take something so he figured could steal from me what I took and be sure I wouldn't report it. That was a terrifying thought because I hadn't stolen anything. I didn't have anything in my pockets from SaveWay. If he went through all my pockets and found nothing worth taking what would he do? He was in a perfect position to slit my throat. I told him he could have anything he wanted.

I heard a noise behind me. I thought someone was approaching. So I started screaming, "HELP! SOMEONE HELP! CALL THE POLICE! HELP!"

A guy came up along-side on a bicycle. The guy pinning me down told the guy on the bicycle I was a shoplifter he'd caught. So I said, "I'm not a shoplifter! Take me back to the store, I'll prove it!" He said, "If you're not a shoplifter, why did you run away?" I said I thought he was going to rob me.

I still think he was going to rob me. He fell back on the "I caught a shoplifter" line because he had a witness now.

He said he would call the police if I didn't show him what I took. I called his bluff and said "PLEASE call the police! That's exactly what I want." So then he said he'd take me back to the store and I'd have to empty my pockets there.

I went back to the SaveWay, with him holding my arms the whole way. When I got to the counter I emptied all my pockets for Mom to see. Mom recognized me, but she didn't want to give me the benefit of the doubt. She told the guy things like, "here's another pocket, look in that one. Maybe the back pockets." There was nothing from the store, of course.

When nothing was found Mom was all smiles. All of the sudden it was no big deal and she was acting like it was all a minor misunderstanding. I asked her if the guy worked for her. She said no.

Now I'm thinking, what the fuck, if he doesn't work for her, why was she treating him like the store security? One of the other customers suggested a possibility: They're paying paying people like this off with 6-packs if they catch someone stealing.

Even after I emptied my pockets and they had nothing the guy wouldn't let up with the accusations. He showed me where he had seen me pocket something. it was where I had priced the honey. The fucking moron had assaulted me for pricing a jar of honey.

I went back to the front and worried about how I was going to get home now. The guy was right there, Mom was acting like it was no big deal, and I had to think this asshole would follow me home and this time haul me into an alley and slit my throat. I was not convinced that he never intended to mug me.

I started getting angry and I raised my voice. "How do I get home when this guy could follow me?" I was about to demand that the police be called when my assailant left. I talked to Mom a little more but now I was pumped up with adrenaline and in no mood to talk softly. I was demanding answers and Mom was just smiling.

After two minutes of that the guy came back to tell Mom that he found a witness who had seen me throw something away that was picked up by an accomplice.

That cinched it. This man himself had his eyes on me from the time I walked out of the store until he caught me and threw me down just short of Washington Street. He would have seen me throw something down. He knew he didn't see me do any such thing. He was lying, trying to back up his claim that I stole to Mom with an "independent source." I told him his friend down the street who fed him that story was full of shit and he knew it and he was full of shit, too, because he knew it, and I said it all in such a tone of voice that Mom asked me to leave. Which I did, without saying another word.

I think the customer was dead on right. I think Mom is paying drunks off with beer to be vigilantes for her store.

Even if I'm wrong, I know this: she didn't give a shit when I protested being assaulted. All she cared about was getting back some item that she thought I might have took off her shelf.

I'm not taking my business to her anymore.

I called the police and made a report. An officer saw me at my apartment, and said he'd go look for a guy fitting my description. If he found him they'd call me and have me go over and ID. If it was the guy I remembered, he'd be arrested for assault. If they didn't find him the officer said at least they'd question Mom.

That was an hour and a half ago. I don't hold up much hope for getting this jerk in jail. The only thing I hope for now is that being questioned by the police about this kind of shit might wake Mom up to the seriousness of it.

Addendum: I just remembered that at one point while initially in the store, I took my wallet out to see how much money I really had. It didn't put it back right away, but had it in my hand just before I priced the honey. To pick the honey up, I first put my own wallet away.

So maybe the moron didn't assault me for pricing a jar of honey. maybe he assaulted me for putting my own wallet in my pocket.

The Dirt on the Underground

[The subsidized apartment building I live in is called The Union Hotel. It's run by DESC, Seattle's Downtown Emergency Service Center. All the residents have been homeless. I write a column for the monthly building newsletter. The column is called Out of My Mind. I'm posting them here, properly dated, because I can. -- wes]

Forty years ago I heard there was a writer guy who wanted high school kids to help excavate something called the Seattle Underground – except that in those days nobody capitalized it.

The writer was Bill Speidel, a Times columnist and Seattle history buff. He wrote about Doc Maynard, famous Seattle founder and drunk. Some people blame Maynard for the weird streets in the Pioneer Square area, which supposedly got that way because he was drunk when he planned them. Actually his plan was neat and simple. It was his sober neighbors north of Yesler who created the mess. Doc Maynard was a drunk, but he had lucid moments.

Anyway, I volunteered to help. A bunch of us volunteers all reported to Speidel’s Pioneer Square office one day and crammed inside for a chat with the author.

Ever notice how offices in Pioneer Square all have bare brick walls inside? That was Speidel’s idea -- to create a look of history. In the 1890s the walls were covered with wood or with plaster and wallpaper. He didn’t care. He was after the LOOK of history.

In those days Pioneer Square was a pit. A lot of it was boarded up. Nobody lived here but homeless people. There were no art galleries, no fancy restaurants. There was no nightlife. By dressing the area up to LOOK historic and showing it off, and by making the Underground famous, Speidel saved the district from the wrecking ball. And he was the first to make a mint off tourists from it.

After our chat we all went down into the Underground as it was then: dark tunnel after dark tunnel of dusty dry dirt. We shoveled dirt into wheelbarrows for hours. We got no hard hats and no dust masks. Our lungs must have filled with the stuff.

I told my Father about all this after the second day. He hit the ceiling. “This guy’s getting you to do this and you get no protection AND he doesn’t pay you? He should have to pay minimum wage! At least, if he’s not going to pay you, he should take care that you don’t get sick or injured! I suppose he didn’t insure himself for liability either, did he?”

My Dad, like Maynard, was kind of a drunk and he could be a real pain, but now and then he had his lucid moments.