Are You Afraid Of The Dark?

At the moment, yes. Last Thursday a woman was shot and killed 2 miles from my apartment. On the same night, another woman was shot at and missed in an attempted robbery...in the park at the end of my block. The same as-yet-unidentified man is suspected in both shootings.

In the past month, three men have been assaulted and robbed within a 2.5-mile radius of my apartment, all to the south and west of here.

Both women were transgender; all three men were gay.


Tonight I had a lovely evening of Darjeeling cocktails and games with friends at their apartment, but I had to ask one of them to stop drinking her cocktail early so she could later drive me home the 1.1-mile distance to my apartment—three out of the five assaults took place on the route from their apartment to mine.


I HATE feeling unsafe. Normally, I feel confident and safe in any setting. Most people who have talked to me about "bad neighborhoods" have been middle-class white people who just can't handle being surrounded by people of color from any class lower than upper. In this case, however, there has been a recent spate of very violent attacks against queer people (two white, two black, one Latino) very near where I live. I am afraid to be out at night alone.

 I guess I can now understand what most women in this country feel most of the time. At least after dark. I can't say I enjoy the empathy.