Riot

Riot

I was in the main crowd on Georgia Street at Hamilton Street with a friend of mine. Because we knew there was a possibility of riot, we made an escape plan early on. The crowd was happy for the first 2 periods. During the third period, everyone just seemed deflated. After the 4th goal, they started to get restless. We discussed whether we should leave then or wait it out. We decided to stay.

Then, with 3 minutes left in the game, a few obnoxious individuals started screaming and throwing things at the big projector screens that were showing the game. Then, about 10 feet from us some morons started shaking a car (why someone left their car there, I will never understand), and then within a few seconds a group flipped over the car. At that point, we decided it was unwise to hang about.

So we started to execute the escape plan. We only had to go around the corner to be okay. We watched the last 2 minutes of the game from there. Then a group of about 4 teenage boys started to approach the main area chanting "Let's go riot, let's go!", which we took to be a very bad sign. We waited about 30 seconds and saw that things were worsening instead of improving. We then continued to leave.

Fortunately, we didn't have to go far. Only a block north of Georgia everyone was calm but sad. Thousands of people walked the streets heading west. Some hugging and consoling each other, some angry, some saying "next year". The occasional post box was punched. The police were watching. Everything was fine.

We got to Granville Street and it was the same situation, everyone dispersing, some people milling about. We headed back south toward Georgia. At Granville and Georgia it was the same. People were going down to the sky train station, people were hanging around. But then a few more people started to push over newspaper boxes, start yelling, etc. Then there was a terrible noise from behind us down Georgia St. We turned and looked and could see a giant plume of smoke going up in front of where we had been only minutes before, watching the game. Suddenly, the police radios started going off and they went running east toward the smoke through all of the people heading the other way, trying to get away from it. Then we saw the flames.

We waited for a minute or two and then continued West, away from the epicenter of things going bad. There were hundreds and thousands of people walking the streets, some heading toward the madness, some heading away from it.

We ended up at a restaurant on Robson street, above the street. About an hour after we got there, police cars started whizzing past going somewhere. Then the helicopters started circling and we started to get calls and messages asking if we were okay. Later that night, we walked back to my place and there were still many people in the streets, but there was this horrible sense of doom in the air, like "what have we done?!"

Tania decided to walk back across Granville bridge, as it had been closed. I heard sirens out my window for several hours.

It is deeply disheartening that this had to happen. Vancouver was just starting to get out from under it's reputation as a "no fun city" through outdoor concerts, movies, events, etc. And the public screenings of the games were a wonderful example of that. There has been a beautiful sense of community and camaraderie in the city these past weeks, with strangers high-fiving each other and hugs and dancing. But now that is all ruined. It will be a long long time before there is any trust again. The broader implications of these events on this city and this community are horrible and will be far reaching. It makes me so sad.

From what I saw, and having been in the centre of when it started, I do not think I am wrong, it was a few groups of irate teenage boys who simply wanted an excuse to act out that caused this to happen. And of course, the crowd mentality swept it up. It's so pathetic. A better outlet is clearly needed.

It's a sad day.

One of the things that surprised me most was who checked in to see if I was okay, and who didn't. Who worries when the shit hits the fan is often not who you think it will be.

The Results of All Our Days

I've done some bad things.
I've done things that I don't know how to forgive myself for.
Or how to forgive others for.
I fell down rabbit holes and I ask myself "How did I let that happen?"
But I don't have an answer. I lived it, but I don't know how. What's that Matt Good line?

"Looking back it seems so simple, but how we done it, I couldn't say."

I'm such a harsh judge. Such a cruel critic. Of both myself and others.
I met a man last weekend and he 'suggested' I 'work on compassion'.
Yeah, well...

Some roads are easy to travel.
Forgiveness is worn over and abandoned.
But the grass is cut and fences shinny along the road to judgment that lives in my mind.
Those neural pathways are well worn.

It's funny that my greatest sins were both perpetrated against and with the same individual.
I'm like one of those guys who was beaten as a child and then turns around and beats their child black and blue. How one can be both perpetrator and victim in the same breath.
How we ended up so entangled, I will never understand.

I think, there are some people with whom it's just magic. You always click. You always have something to say, you laugh, you understand, you see them for who they truly are, flawed, lovely, well-intentioned fuck ups. Almost like you see through the mask at the treasure underneath. There are a few people in my life of whom I can clearly say I have an undefinable and unspoken kinship with and love of.

But I also think it's circumstances. There are certain dynamics which create invisible and unarticulated ties that can bond people in ways that are hard to make sense of. Those circumstances can build a trust and a respect and a connection that is extremely difficult to explain. Not in a gooey way, but in a way that comes from being your most vulnerable with other people and having them not run away.

I'm gonna go out on a limb of trash here and quote from one of the "Twilight" movies:

"When I left, I left you bleeding. And he stitched you up. And it left it's mark on both of you."

And it has. And it does. That quote doesn't account for the impact when that experience is not a solo act. In my particular case, one particular person was there for me like no other during 2 of the most traumatizing and painful times of my life. Circumstances beyond the pale of common experience. And in those dark and terrible times, I was indeed held together, and am grateful to have been held together. But that dynamic complicates our bond. It has become woven into it and can no longer be untangled. Which adds to and confuses our relationship in a world of myriad complex relationships and limited trust.

There's this place I go to from time to time and I'm quite convinced that the appeal of it for so many is the phenomenon of bonding. The programs there push you to know and see yourself in horrible technicolour ways, to dig out the truths burried within you that our society and our pride works so hard to keep locked away. But there you are, forced to face your shit.

And then the motherfuckers ask that you share it with others. It's terrifying. But what happens, almost without exception, is that people understand. People relate to the ugliest parts of you. People embrace you and care for you and want you around all the same. They don't freak out or judge you. They show you nothing but love and compassion. And so you get this glow after a couple of days from this sense of peace and freedom, because you can just be your whole self and not hide for a change. But then you have to return to the real, cold world. And suddenly all you want to do is go back. And thus the cycle of handing over large chunks of your money as often as you can begins.

What I find really strange about that is that those relationships, those intense bonds, are generally fleeting. They go, they do a workshop, they cry and yell and support each other, perhaps exchange an email or two and then disperse.

But not me. I bond for life. I friend for life. I love for life. I don't know how to do differently. Which makes gathering people and gathering guilt very easy. It makes letting go and compassion very hard.