Tonight the San Francisco Giants won the World Series.
And now I am listening to a website that is playing the San Francisco police scanner as ‘riots’ occur.
I put quotations around ‘riots’ because I am not in them. I do not know.
But wait, I am in the internet age. I kind of know. With twitpics and YouTube and even a freaking website put together so I can listen to the police scanner live!
When I checked Twitter and saw that #SFriot was a trending topic, I (as an SF resident who was not knowingly rioting) did the first thing that I believe a majority of our population would do. I turned on the TV. And I flipped through the local channels looking for news. But it was all drab late-night talk show hosts making their drab jokes for a tired audience. So I took 3 paces to my computer. And it was almost like living through it all. Live video of flying beer bottles and cops in a line and Skechers signs doing nothing. Slowly striding ‘rioters’ possibly looting a store. If so, it was kind of a classic-zombie paced loot.
Of course, I had already been in it. The Giants won while I was at work. So on my walk home, I got to see the strangers high five on the streets and listen to the jilting horns and the screaming voices. Oh yeah, and I did get to avoid the graceful arc of that thrown beer bottle. (You are no Tim Lincecum, sir.)
For everyone outside of the City, I am sure it looks horrid and disgusting and embarrassing. I know there was that racist fuck on Twitter who was using this moment to talk shit about illegal immigrants (from his farm in Montana, I am pretty positive). While I may not always agree with (read as respect) those in uniform, it is a really crappy night for them. And I apologize.
But there was a moment…
I haven’t really cared about baseball since I was a wee tyke. By nature, I still hate the Yankees. So long as they lose, I don’t care about much else in the MLB.
Still, at some point in the night, the infection began to grow. A Texas Rangers outfielder missed a fly ball. Nearby bars shouts of happiness and laughter. A home run. Screams of ecstasy. There weren’t a lot of big plays in the game, but when there were, you could hear it. You could feel it.
It made me sad that I wasn’t in Boston when the 2001 Patriots pulled off their own miracle season. To be amidst such revelry for a team I actually cared about…
But when that last pitch was thrown, it didn’t matter. It didn’t matter if you were a Giants fan or cared about baseball or even spoke English. Gay, straight, republican, martian or adorable little pug.
This is the closest I will ever come to that interconnected, Mother Gaya, pseudo-religion type bullshit. When that last out was made, the City was connected. And happy. We still had customers walking in who obviously didn’t care (or else they would have been watching, not picking up crappy electronics), but they still raised their fist and shouted ‘go Giants!’ There was honking and screaming and laughing and drinking and kissing and high-fiving. And even Serious McNeverCrackASmile couldn’t help but smirk at the occasion.
Everyone felt it.
So I am sorry that it has ‘devolved’ into something that is going to be viewed so negatively. Because it was such a great moment that I will forever remember being a part of. It was happy and it was human.
This has been a jittery, off-focus, maybe pointless piece. Kind of like this evening. So I guess I will sum it up by saying:
If only we could have more of these moments, where race or creed or your position on Prop FU doesn’t matter, then our country could be a better place. And we can, if we stop recognizing each other as gay or republican or police officer or gay republican police officer and start seeing each other for what we all are. Flawed meat sacks trying to survive on a tiny pebble that is floating through a vast oblivion of nothing towards undoubted destruction.
Oh, and less fires.
Not no fires. Just less fires.
As one final note, I have to add that this sounds a little like Stewart and the Rally to Restore Sanity, so let me give him his speech.
