Sunday

keepin it quirky



i tend to be a-political. sit back and watch. i'm patient enough to wait and see. somehow this one has me riled. *see previous post* it has everyone riled.
bisbee is a small abandoned mining town. everything built on top of something. quarters are tight. in Old bisbee there really are no 'neighborhoods'. you have doctors living next to junkies. border patrol next to artists/activists. young familes next to ex-cons. and when i saw 'next to' i mean in many cases RIGHT NEXT TO. and it works. without much strife. why? cause it's bisbee and when folks move in they are often looking to get away from the big cities with their big lots and big lines of seperation.
bums, vagrants, crackheads - we got them too. they sit in the parks. don't think of your big suburban parks. these are areas smaller than my house just off the main streets. as a mom of two small kids - NEVER have i been threatend, harrassed, ANYTHING in the park. these people are people. often really interesting. crazy at times, but who's not? i feel safe. they were here before me. i accept that.
so now we have this big shot business guy in town. he's been here years, he should know... he owns the ONE coffee house. one of the three finer resturaunts. and now just opened another "authentic mexican" place across from the park. he's done really well for himself so far - but i smell a boycott. his tourist customers now have a great view of the 'vagrants' and it is upsetting their digestion. (SO HE CLAIMS) so they are asking people to leave the park. and calling the cops if they don't. the other day they made a guy leave the park - who was on his lunch break from work - trying to enjoy his lunch. His name is Scruffy, and yes, at times he's out of work. but not the day in question. he was doing nothing except eating.
it's ironic - he opens an 'authentic' mexican eatery. has he never BEEN to mexico? it doesn't get more authentic than vagrants and panhandlers taking seista on the street.
ramble ramble ramble... so know we have this proposal. and it pisses me off. the main "problems" are happening between 2-4 in the morning. what volunteer will take that shift?
this is just one man's beef with reality. we won't let him turn this into a police state. and he pretends it will be an aide to the tourists...
so i say - if it happens - we will start handing out red vests to our vagrants. we have some mighty characters in town and they'd run with an official badge as such.
i say - start the OB BO tour. (old bisbee body odor) led by our more eclectic, you can tour the sleeping, shitting, shootin up spots of bisbee's gypsies.
they've been here always. they are part of our history and present. they're real. pretending we are a fancier town won't work. people come here to get away from that.
ok - i'm done.

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