The B-Side: Machete: A True Story

A New Yorker in Los Angeles

There are certain economic indicators that can tell you at a glance what kind of neighborhood you’ve found yourself in. I call these “street level indicators”, because it’s less about the size of the homes; some people go into serious debt to build McMansions in middle class neighborhoods, often breaking the law and taking their homes to the literal edge of their property line.

No, these are usually the kinds of stores and restaurants you find on the street. For instance, if the mall has an Apple Store in it, you’re in a pretty good neighborhood. If the mall has no air conditioning and the only restaurant in the food court is Chinese to go, run. (For one thing, it means you’re in San Bernardino.)

Whole Foods and Trader Joes mean you’re in safe harbor. Dollar Tree and a 99-cent supermarket mean you’re in for choppy weather. The swing vote is Starbucks, which is in every neighborhood and is either the crappiest coffee shop in town or the nicest.

My neighborhood has it all, and you can drive to Whole Foods in either direction, Trader Joes, or the Dollar Tree which replaced the 99-cent superstore. There’s every direction there’s fancy upscale pizza places but also Dominos, Pizza Hut, and Papa John’s.

Which is why the cheapest place to get gas the Ralphs supermarket gas station across the street from Ralphs supermarket. And the best time to get gas is at 2am when most people are in bed asleep.

That’s what I was doing when I tracked a man walking purposefully across the gas station holding what I realized after a couple moments of watching was a machete. It’s one of those things where you realize what it is after you see it, and you’re so unsure that you’re correct that you do a broad double take like in an old Abbot & Costello movie when Lou sees the special guest monster for the first time.

I was worried that this fellow would catch me staring, and I decided that if it came down to it I was fully prepared to risk a $500 fine and drive off with the pump still in my car.

But the fellow with the machete was so intent in his purpose that he never I think even noticed me as he headed towards, what I realized in a moment, was the 7-11 next to the gas station.

In that moment I had a choice. I could have confronted the gentleman holding a foot long razor designed to cut through tree trunks and ask what he was up to. This, I quickly rationalized, was simply none of my business, and if this guy wanted to wander the streets otherwise empty of vehicles, people, or officers of the law, then who was I to impose my values on him?

My second choice was to trust that he was going to 7-11 on legitimate business. After all, he could have been taking a hike up to the Hollywood sign, creating his own shortcut, and when the sun went down said, “I’m still game for a stroll so I think I’ll kill another eight hours and take a stroll into the San Fernando Valley.”

And when he got to the Ralphs gas station, it’s entirely likely that he said to himself, “Since I’ve taken the evening air the only thing left to do is purchase a pack of cigarettes and some beef jerky, and off to the 7-11 he went.”

In that case, not only was I being a nosy parker but also possibly a bigot against those who choose to practice their rights as Americans to carry any kind of weapon they want at any time. In America, I’ve learned, there are a lot of people who are both armed to the teeth and perpetually victimized.

There are plenty of Americans who have to maintain a stockpile of automatic weapons against the day that the jackbooted thugs in the government come to take their stockpile of automatic weapons.

And so I am, in a way, a protector of the Constitution by standing by like a coward and doing nothing.

My third option, of course, was to call the police. but then I would have been responsible for all kinds paperwork and making witness statements to corroborate that the the fellow that three precincts worth of cops, a national Guard battalion, an armored column of Marines, and a squad of fat ICE officers, shot into a puddle of goo had been armed at one point early in their encounter.

I chose option 2, and as I was sitting in my car with the engine running and my foot on the gas pedal, I noticed neither screaming coming from the 7-11 nor sprays of blood gushing geysers up the glass doors. Instead, the man with the machete slowly, peacefully, exited and walked back from whence he came. And I did, too, at about 75 MPH.

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