There’s something spooky about a deserted carnival midway just before a storm hits, the canopies whipping in the wind, their colors all the more salient against the darkened sky, and the Carnies huddled beneath the awnings of the game carts waiting for the rain. We hadn’t even begun selling wristbands Thursday when the tornado sirens began wailing in the distance and in the far off sky we noticed the inky black storm clouds rolling our way.
An accurate forecast was elusive. Even though everyone was listening to the same emergency broadcast, we all heard different things. It’s going to… Continue Reading Tag Archives: Race
Grappling with Rain, Wristbands and Racism
There’s something spooky about a deserted carnival midway just before a storm hits, the canopies whipping in the wind, their colors all the more salient against the darkened sky, and the Carnies huddled beneath the awnings of the game carts waiting for the rain. We hadn’t even begun selling wristbands Thursday when the tornado sirens began wailing in the distance and in the far off sky we noticed the inky black storm clouds rolling our way.
An accurate forecast was elusive. Even though everyone was listening to the same emergency broadcast, we all heard different things. It’s going to… Continue Reading Old Friend Hunting
Edgerton, WI – Disappearances are like this: here one moment, gone the next. So it was with Aaron, a friend since high school, who quietly absconded from Madison around 2002. No good-byes. No forwarding address. No new number. Simply gone. Poof! Just like that. All connections, severed like arties and left to bleed out.
Back then, we figured the disappearance was only temporary. Aaron fell off from time-to-time, retreating to Edgerton, about 45-minutes south of Madison, where he had family. There he worked with his father, roofing houses, and patronized his aunt’s bar in the off-hours. When he tired of… Continue Reading Mining for Hope in Shenandoah
Shenandoah, PA – For more than five years, Carlos Vega has fought to bring the police officers he believes are responsible for his son’s death to justice. “They killed my boy,” Carlos told The Feral Scribe late last month. “I’m going to get justice for David.”
David Vega was an 18-year-old high school student on Nov. 28, 2004, when he and his younger brother fell into a heated verbal argument on their porch. Hearing the commotion, neighbors began stepping from their homes, one of whom called police. Two officers arrived and David began mouthing off. He was arrested. Two… Continue Reading The Illadelph State of Mind
Philadelphia, PA – I had never stepped foot in Philadelphia prior to moving here in 2008. Had been to the east coast just once, in the 6th grade for a school trip to Washington D.C. But at 31, I was itching to get out of Madison and my girlfriend billed Philly as a place where opportunity flowed like beer from a tap. A crack survey of Craigslist and some local blogs all but confirmed that Philly was indeed a happening place. A few months later we loaded up the Penske and set out to catch some of that brotherly… Continue Reading 
The House Where Poe Wrote