In the wee hours of the pandemic, I recall waking to the sound of thunder. The gentrification of our street had begun.

Living just two tiny blocks from the ever-popular Bishop Arts district, we’ve watched it spread our direction like some kind of disease or Marvel-brand destructive space anomaly. Our property value has grown incredibly, and so have the Zillo listings all around us. This began to cause a handful of scenarios for the older residents of this neighborhood.

1. Abandoned homes with a For Sale sign
2. Renovated quickly as though there were a time limit.
3. Oddly caught fire in the middle of the night, bulldozed, and replaced with these eye-sore 3 story town homes being sold for four times what they’re worth. You get better deals at Rent-A-Center, folks.

For the first couple of years, I felt judging eyes upon me – being the lone middle-aged, bearded white dude, aka the face of the enemy, in the community. To be honest, there were moments when I felt dreadfully ashamed of my own genetics whenever I would visit the local stores and parks. Then, I saw the light. Er, the cart.

The aging hippie writer I am, I spend quite a bit of time sitting in a lawn chair and watching the world go by. Anything can spark a story, and I prefer to be there when it happens. Loose lips sink ships; loud carts build Arts.

I started to notice a golf cart winding through our streets during business hours. Inside are normally two individuals; a man and a woman. She possesses not an indoor voice.

One day, I decided to interact by waving. Rather than be polite to the white devil in the lawn chair, she pointed and asked the driver, “is that property ours as well?”

He replied, “I don’t think so; not yet.”

Golf carts, being the official vehicle af the semi-wealthy, aging, white American fat-ass society, are not stealthily camouflaged in a mostly lower-class Hispanic neighborhood. Over the last two years, through numerous bits of conversation along their travels & visual deductions going about my daily life (same construction company, same face on the real estate signs), I believe this is a neighborhood mini-coup by wealthier, legal latino-Americans against their more meager – whatever the case may be – counterparts.

Let’s face it: I thought “Latinos For Trump” was the dumbest thing I’d ever heard, until my YouTube algorithm adjusted from watching so many Charlemagne The God videos. Google “Black Fatigue “. No joke, this is a thing, and are you surprised?

I guess it’s not so far-fetched. I’m a cloudy white dude who prefers to avoid his fellow Honkeys whenever possible. There’s a large portion of white people who exhibit some unthinkable qualities, and I hate the fact I could cosplay as one of them with a fake accent, a quick shower, and a change of clothes.

I’m not sure I can blame our president anymore for the violent, appalling temperature in this country; our society has just spoiled. We’ve gone rotten as a species, and it has nothing to do with race or religion. Even the most beautiful bunch of carrots spoil if left to fester in their refrigerated misery. Those who have manipulated the system to their advantage are warring against those of us who figured complacency was a fine idea. I’m a worker bee turned storyteller, and tell stories, I must, as I see fit.

WW3 is a slow-burning class-war that began with Russia’s attack on Ukraine, and it’s slowly trickling down to the Pawns. That’s us, folks. The media blinds us with color while greed is the true enemy. If at all possible, drop a deuce in a billionaires house and forget to flush. It’s liberating. Preach truths, tome jokes, and shoplift Amazon.

Happy Saturday.

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