Sorry dear reader.

Every day, every night I hear it here.

As I waited on the “white man”* signal at a pedestrian crossing in Gastown, a man on the opposite side looking at me started shouting, and arguing quite vehemently, I looked over my shoulder looking for his argument partner but there was no one to be seen. The discourse continued as the “white man” signalled it was safe to cross towards this still viscously shouting man. He passed me on the road continuing his diatribe to the street behind me.

Lying in bed I heard a girl crying this on the street outside to someone maybe to a ‘john’ or her pimp at 530 one morning. He shouted back: “I’ll F**k you up!” She needed way more than a word.

Mostly, it’s a shouting match… mostly.

Once walking down Hastings a man told me to “F**k off!”, I was with a group singing carols and distributing sweets and hot chocolate before Christmas. It wasn’t personal.

But he was arguing with a couple and then started calling the woman a ‘slut’ so lots of “f-bombs” were exchanged until someone told him to stop disrespecting a woman.

He didn’t.

And he got, according to other onlookers, “a well deserved” beating for disrespecting said woman. It was over in seconds. No time to call the cops.

He got up and lumbered away somewhat wordless.

Nine out of ten times these aggressive statements are hurled at persons who are not even in the vicinity. Hallucinogenic visions, memories of abuse and pain, of the abuser/s play before their eyes. They are fighting back in the only way they know. It is not working.

I sense the demonic at work but being of a finite number the demons have hatched a plan to maintain their oppression. The plan; simple really:- give the illusion of momentary release from pain in whatever drug of choice and then lock the victim up in the darkened cinema of their mind and screen the home movies back to back of the worst pain these people have known. “F**k off” isn’t going to hack it.

A greater word is needed.

*Footnote:
Pedestrian crossings in Vancouver have a white man walking picture to show that it is safe to cross the road. This then changes to a time in seconds, counting down, flashing red and then to a red hand to indicate stop. It has been explained to me that it has its own connotations here with “white men” being the invaders/colonisers/conquerors/ drivers/ enforcers and the “red men” being those who greet and say “stop a while and just be”.

Dedicated to my friend Dermy. 🙄