Although the seasons have changed and winter is now here, the summer of 2013 is still at the front of most of my daily thoughts. It was a long summer that I spent in between my real life and the one I had stumbled into online.
This blog had taken me completely off track and into places that seemed to take pleasure in lies and confusion. And the deeper I sank in the quicksand the more I realized I was in a fight with a tar baby. One I had no hope in winning. But the great thing about the internet is you can turn it off. And I could, couldn’t I? If the lies and games of Facebook, Twitter, and numerous accompanying blogs were getting to be too much, I could just turn it off. And I did so many times this summer, but not for too long, of course. There was too much going on for me to stay a way for any length of time. By the end of the summer though, that almost changed.
When I left off I was wrapped up in LISK.com stuff as well as other things I was seeing things on different social medias that just made me cringe. From the ongoing feud between Murt and Michelle McKee to the out of control doxing of anon friends and foes. The worst of it was on Twitter. The things that people tweet about is outrageous! And it’s hard, if not impossible to tell who is being sincere and who is doing shtick. When you see numerous accounts where people talk about being depressed and wanting to kill themselves that seem more like blog wars than real cries for help, it’s hard not to question purpose. I mean, I see all these sites there to “fight” bullying but they seem to be wrapped up in the same techniques for “internet flair”. Everyone pointing fingers and calling names like it’s one big cyber school yard. It had all been “Too Much”, but I continued on…
I had made a Twitter account: https://twitter.com/ZeroDinh
and a Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/zerosworld?ref=hl#
I have to admit, I wasn’t very good in the Twitter world. Can’t get out what I have to say in 140 characters or less. I’m just too complex for the simplicity of Twitter. But we’ll get back to my Twitter fail. First let’s go back to June. I had made a final post for the LISK site in June:
http://liskdotcom.wordpress.com/2013/06/15/this-is-the-end/ ( I added the question mark in November when I had decided to start blogging again)
I then wrote the exhausting post titled “It’s All Too Much” here on my Prophet Blog:
https://zeroprophetblog.wordpress.com/2013/06/27/its-all-too-much/
It would end up being my last post anywhere until I stared up my LISK blog again in November.
But I didn’t know that at the time, I was just trying to move on from the LISK stuff and clear out some of this other stuff I was reading about. I was just taking a breather.
That’s about the time Facebook lit up with posts about Paula Deen and her possible racist views. My own views on racism and bigotry should be some what apparent by now, but just in case, I find all hypocrisies to be wrong and a waste of time, I am not above them but I try hard to cure my self of any and all such hypocrisies when I see them arise, something more people should strive at doing, in my own humble opinion of course. Our hypocrisies are based on lies and I think my stance on lies has definitely been made apparent.
So, all that being said, you can imagine some of my replies on Facebook to those who felt it necessary to come to not only Paula Deen’s defense but the defense of the entire white race. Here’s a card I made and posted:
I also wrote a long post on how I feel about the “mythical white” race and those who feel the need to defend it all the time. I won’t repost it here, but it’s safe to say that I do not believe in a “white race” nor do I want to be involved with those who think they are part of a “white race”. Still not clear enough? Watch this video:
My favorite dumb ass thing people felt the need to post was the one about how if Wal-Mart was going to pull Paula’s merchandise from their shelves then it needed to pull rap albums that used the same “language”. These were accompanied with pictures of rappers like Lil’ Wayne, and were implying that old “white race” argument, “If they can say that word, why can’t we?”. Fair enough, in a racist type way. Except Wal-Mart has never carried albums that contained such words. Only “edited” versions of such music is available there. You can thank the PMRC for that. A group of “white” ladies (political wives to be exact) who went after “white” heavy metal groups in the 80’s and created the “Explicit Lyrics” sticker, which again Wal-Mart will not carry albums with this sticker. So there are no albums being sold at Wal-Mart using the n-word and there never has been. Dumb asses!
This all led into July and things being said about the Martin/Zimmerman trial. I didn’t know much about what had happened down there in Florida (Florida, what a place, vacation site for Long Islanders… sorry, probably should edit that out) but I was seeing too many things about it and decided to look into it.
The more I looked into the case the more I questioned this “stand your ground law” and what had really happened that night between Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman. I spent the whole day of July 13th on Twitter with my newly made account trying to understand all the negative, inappropriate, and racist things being put out there. There were troll and toon accounts made to poke fun at the whole thing. There were quite a few accounts using the actual crime scene photo of a lifeless Trayvon to assist in the internet joke. A joke I just didn’t get and I tried hard to get my point out there. But as I have already said, I failed miserably at this. I was constantly told if I didn’t like racism and bigotry then Twitter wasn’t the place for me. It was simple, if I didn’t like it, don’t read it. And I can understand that, but it was just so massive and just broke my heart. I felt I had to speak out. But all my Twitter comments got me, was several account freezes and warnings, due to others complaining about me writing on their racist tweets.
We could use hindsight here and ask all of you who posted “Team Zimmerman” on your social media sites how you feel about your “Team” now. But honestly it wasn’t people thinking Zimmerman was not guilty, that was not what got me, it was the carelessness of things being said about Trayvon. It was the fact that many were using the tragedy as if it was some racist joke. And it got to me, it got to me bad.
I already have a love/hate relationship with so-called humanity. And this time it really was too much. I backed off of Twitter and stayed off the internet for a little while.
At the beginning of the summer I had taken a vacation to the beach and did some camping with family. It was just the thing I had needed back then to get my mind of the very confusing LISK blog I had started writing. And now here at the end of the summer after all I had witnessed on the screen of my lap top, another trip to the beach was needed.
I was born and raised on the streets of L.A. and the beaches of southern California, and when ever I get the chance I like to take my family there to just have fun and enjoy life. With all I had been going through online it sounded just like what I needed. So we packed up a rental car and headed back to Cali. I like to travel in comfortable clothes, usually a t-shirt and pajama pants. That day I had on my Superman pajama pants and a t-shirt with a big Superman S right on the chest. Red S, blue shirt.
We had left early and had just got far enough for everyone in the car to have started napping. Everyone but me that is, I was driving. I remember looking at my wife in the passenger seat, her eyes were shut and I wondered if she was sleeping. I glanced in the rear view mirror and saw the kids were also back to sleep. Then something caught the corner of my eye. A dust cloud of some sort on the other side of the highway. As the dust cleared a little I saw that it was a vehicle turning over and over off the side of the free way. “Oh my god!” I gasped, bringing my wife out of any sleep she might have been heading towards. As I brought the car to a stop at the side of the freeway we watched the vehicle come slamming to a halt, once again right side up, on the opposite side of the freeway. I didn’t think, I just ran out of the car and toward the wreck across the other lane. It looked bad. I could see someone who had been thrown from the vehicle, was now walking back towards it. There was no collision, just one vehicle that had gone off the side of the road and tumbled many times before crashing down.
There were others stopping their cars and running to help. As I got to the crash someone exited the destroyed vehicle and ran around the front of it with me. I remember thinking as I came around the other side of the vehicle, maybe it wasn’t that bad, I had already seen 2 people who seemed to be walking away with minor injuries. But this was quickly lost in what can only be called chaos.
It felt like a war zone. Everything got loud and bright. And slow and fast seemed to merge as one to create a rate of time I can not explain. The person who had gotten out of the vehicle and ran around the front with me quickly went to a little girl who was trapped in the wreckage. Others were running up, one who I believe had said he was a paramedic went to help with the girl trapped in the wreckage. The little girl, who had been crying when we ran up, had now stopped all movement completely. My mind was racing and it seemed like so much was going on at once. The man now in the wreckage called out that he was handing the girl out and someone had to hold her. I was there and she was placed out into my arms. I turned holding her and the off duty paramedic came out of the wreckage and found a mat to lay on the ground where I lied her down and stood back and let him try to help her. I said a prayer, but I think I knew it was too late. I felt I was gonna freak out, but I had to keep it together, these people needed help and those of us who ran from our cars to try to help needed to keep it together.
The person who had been ejected from the vehicle as it flipped was now at the rear of the vehicle and was losing consciousness. Someone yelled for some water. Right at this point a motor home pulled off the side of the road. I ran up to it. A couple came out of it and I asked if they had water. the lady got me some bottled water and the man told me he was a doctor. I thanked god and told him what I had witnessed and told him to go to the little girl first. I ran past the girl that I had laid down on the side of the road with the water the doctors wife had given me. There were a few people gathered at the rear of the wreckage and I handed a bottle of water to one of them. The driver of the vehicle that crashed was also there and was freaking out. I tried to calm them down and get them to drink some water. I looked back towards the little girl and they were placing something over her face, a blanket or a jacket. Again I had to fight back the urge to just start screaming out. Now everyone was focusing on the one who had been thrown from the vehicle. They were now having convulsions. I looked up and saw a police car was trying to make his way through the back up of traffic that had built up. I ran to him as he pulled over and again went through all I had witnessed. I followed the officer back to the crash and stood there. There were people everywhere who had pulled off the side of the road and were helping in different areas. I looked over at the little girl who had been placed into my arms, now on the side of the road alone, face covered. I looked away, trying not to break down. Fighting back tears. I looked into the traffic slowly passing by. Some one had their phone out the window taking video footage. Just then some jack ass stuck his arm out the window and pointed. He yelled out “Ha Ha!” trying to sound like that kid from The Simpsons. He had the biggest, dumbest grin on his face, and I lost it.
I didn’t yell out other than the screaming I did in my head. I stood there in my Superman pajamas that now had the blood of a dead little girl on them and looked up into the sky. I screamed out at God, I screamed out at humanity, I screamed out at me. But all in my head. I felt like I might black out. I looked back down, tears streaming down the side of my face. My eyes caught someone looking at me, the doctor’s wife I think, her eyes looked into mine and tears began to flow from hers as well.
I looked away and across the freeway at the car I had run from what seemed like years earlier. There was my family looking out the windows back across the freeway at me.
I pulled it together and wiped my face clean. Went up to the lady who had been watching me and asked if she was alright, she said yes, and together we walked back over to the driver and again helped to keep them calm. An ambulance was now heading our way, so I ran back to my family. They were there watching, waiting. My feeling of helplessness had to be quickly abandoned, because they were waiting for me to come back. They were waiting for me to take them on vacation. Which I did. But I had been shaken to my core. Everything that happened in those moments I had spent on the other side of that highway ran over and over in my mind the rest of the weekend. And honestly still does to this day. But I was just a witness, it is the poor little girl who lost her life in that accident and her family that this truly happened to. It wasn’t for me to get over or past, it didn’t happen to me. But as I said it still shook me deeply.
I wanted to blog about it all when I returned home, but couldn’t. And even though I have now done so, I have left most of the accident description generic and unfinished because I still feel strongly that all though I witnessed it and it affected me it is not my story. Hopefully you (the reader) will get what I am trying to say here and I can move on.
So I never wrote this post. In fact I stopped blogging here all together till now. I just didn’t have anything more to say. I’m no Superman, nothing I say on here was gonna change the way we treated each other or how the internet was being used to confuse and hurt each other. I mean that was the point of my “prophet” blog, right? To try to change… what, the world? I’m not that gullible to have thought that. But I did start this thing hoping to reach others and teach some kind of movement in further understanding of each other. And even now as I write this I still don’t feel anything I can add here will make a difference. The caucus races continue. We go on hurting each other.
Summer is gone, seasons changed, and life went on. And that may be the best way to end this post.
Life goes on. And everyday we are lucky enough to still be a part of it, we owe it to those who are not, to live it the best we can and help others to live it as well.
zeroprophetblog 