Here’s a post I wrote 3 years ago after almost having my phone stolen on BART at the Oakland Coliseum stop (I think?).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He couldn\u2019t have been older than fourteen. I didn\u2019t get a good look at his friends, but they may have been a tad older. In retrospect, that\u2019s probably the case.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I had spent the morning at a social justice conference for educators. It was a unique means of priming a 28-year old Chicano for a brush with some \u201choodrats\u201d as I sometimes think them to be– minority children making trouble– reflections of myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I was finally working on the train home, having left early. Enjoying the fruits of my irresponsible spending, I entered scores into my online gradebook on the newest and latest model of iPhone. It was decked out with completely unnecessary features, and I\u2019m not sure why I elected to spend the money for things I didn\u2019t need. Perhaps it was the half a year of having a phone that barely functioned at all. Maybe it was the need to fill that invisible hole in my chest that\u2019s always plagued me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In any event, one second, I was giving Terrance full-credit for his quick write. In the next, I was watching my phone float out of my hand as it resolved into a firm grasp of the empty air left behind. I didn\u2019t think before leaping from my seat. It was only as I began to round the corner to the exit, five or so meters from my seat, did my thoughts return to the bag I had left behind, full of student notebooks and a Mac Book Pro that was even more expensive than my phone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A moment of hesitation resolved into continued action: \u201cWorry about it later. Get the phone.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sure enough, as I rounded the corner to the train doors, which were no more than five meters from my seat, I saw him. A fresh face, almost smiling, looking at me from the ground. He was lying down and the phone was there in front of him with the screen facing down. I walked over and picked it up. Looking at his face, I spoke, \u201cFucking idiot.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I turned with ire, disgust and more than a little confusion back into the train and to my seat. A woman leaned in to the exit farther down the train to ask if they had tried to rob me. I confirmed to some capacity and the woman sitting in front of me asked if I was going to get off to report them. By then the train was preparing to leave, and I made an excuse of the laptop in the bag I had left waiting for me on the train to walk away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I knew I couldn\u2019t report them. His face was my own after a car chase. It was the face I made after hopping fences and scrambling away from police. It was my face after feeling alive in a sea of dead wishes. They were simply discovering the thrill of epinephrine and flight with its absence of the scars and bruises of the fight. I almost laughed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Young, dumb kids.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But, how will it play for them next time? What lessons had they learned? I can only hope they learned the right ones. I didn\u2019t give myself time to teach them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Here’s a post I wrote 3 years ago after almost having my phone stolen on BART at the Oakland Coliseum stop (I think?). ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ He couldn\u2019t have been older than fourteen. I didn\u2019t get a good look at his friends, but they may have been a tad older. In retrospect, that\u2019s probably the case. I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","hide_page_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-47","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jmadrigal.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jmadrigal.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jmadrigal.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jmadrigal.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jmadrigal.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.jmadrigal.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":48,"href":"https:\/\/www.jmadrigal.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47\/revisions\/48"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jmadrigal.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jmadrigal.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jmadrigal.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}