What THE fuck!
I was shot at tonight. Well, either me or the window of the video store the bullet hit.
Yah, a drive by shooting. Between Donlands and Pape subway stations on the Danforth.
Walking along, looking in the big video store (Rogers?) when there is a very loud and sharp pop and then a nearly immediate sharp retort of thick glass cracking/shattering.
As I instinctively ducked and turned to see what the hell, my mind starts to scream ("gunshot??!") and as I began to look for cover (a big trash bin) a white car, in no particular hurry turns the corner and drives away. A couple coming out of the store looked at me and I asked the world at large, "Were we just shot at?" They didn't say anything. We sort of looked at the front of the store like idiots and then there high on the widow I spot a softball sized hole smashed in the thick outer pane of the window, and a cleaner hole or indentation in the inner pane.
Now I wish I'd looked more closely. But.
At that moment, I said fuck it and looked up the side street to see if I could see the "fleeing" car. It turned (as if to come around the block -- so I immediately though -- and in the direction I needed to go to get quickly to the Pape subway station. I figured I should stick around to talk to the cops but I had one thought -- to get under ground and onto the relative safety of the train.
As I passed a patio just across the side street, three old guys asked, "Did someone just shoot that store? Sure sounded like a gunshot." That did nothing for my rationalizing mind which was telling me it was a stone thrown from a tire, or maybe a slingshot -- neither explaining that first too loud crack/pop of a gun upclose. That sound that when real sounds fake to everyone used to (thank gawd) TV gun sounds. But that close the pop has more of a sharp sound -- I've been in firing ranges.
I started at every fucking white car coming down the street until I was in the subway station and then crossing Bloor and Church near home a car hit something small on the road and I actually ducked.
What makes all this the more surreal is the fact that on Friday I witnessed (3 minutes from home), in broad daylight, cops chasing a guy chasing a guy pointing a gun at the head of the guy he was chasing. The cops all had their guns out too.
Now the anger begins.
Or maybe it WAS a stone thrown by a tire.
Yah, a drive by shooting. Between Donlands and Pape subway stations on the Danforth.
Walking along, looking in the big video store (Rogers?) when there is a very loud and sharp pop and then a nearly immediate sharp retort of thick glass cracking/shattering.
As I instinctively ducked and turned to see what the hell, my mind starts to scream ("gunshot??!") and as I began to look for cover (a big trash bin) a white car, in no particular hurry turns the corner and drives away. A couple coming out of the store looked at me and I asked the world at large, "Were we just shot at?" They didn't say anything. We sort of looked at the front of the store like idiots and then there high on the widow I spot a softball sized hole smashed in the thick outer pane of the window, and a cleaner hole or indentation in the inner pane.
Now I wish I'd looked more closely. But.
At that moment, I said fuck it and looked up the side street to see if I could see the "fleeing" car. It turned (as if to come around the block -- so I immediately though -- and in the direction I needed to go to get quickly to the Pape subway station. I figured I should stick around to talk to the cops but I had one thought -- to get under ground and onto the relative safety of the train.
As I passed a patio just across the side street, three old guys asked, "Did someone just shoot that store? Sure sounded like a gunshot." That did nothing for my rationalizing mind which was telling me it was a stone thrown from a tire, or maybe a slingshot -- neither explaining that first too loud crack/pop of a gun upclose. That sound that when real sounds fake to everyone used to (thank gawd) TV gun sounds. But that close the pop has more of a sharp sound -- I've been in firing ranges.
I started at every fucking white car coming down the street until I was in the subway station and then crossing Bloor and Church near home a car hit something small on the road and I actually ducked.
What makes all this the more surreal is the fact that on Friday I witnessed (3 minutes from home), in broad daylight, cops chasing a guy chasing a guy pointing a gun at the head of the guy he was chasing. The cops all had their guns out too.
Now the anger begins.
Or maybe it WAS a stone thrown by a tire.
posted by Heipel at
12:09 AM
3 Comments:
ARE YOU OKAY????
really okay???????...DAMN!!!
WOW! Faster than a speeding bullet. I am so glad that you're alright and able to write about your experience. There are people all the way out here in Newfoundland who are breathing easier knowing you're OK. : o)
ohmygawd. glad to hear you're okay.
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