You know how on First Friday in September hundreds of people get together to do something fun and creative? That sucks now and should be exclusionary. We have this post:
A commenter thinks this is a bad idea, but for a rather unique reason. They say, “I generally don’t like being around a bunch of kids but adults are worse to me these days honestly.”
You really don’t like anything, do you?
Some of us think kicking kids out of the free-form design bike ride is dumb. One person says, “Oh, that’s why folks post anonymously”
Another says, “C’mon man…did you not see the kid with the T-rex ride?! That was AWESOME” Also the one drumming. And the one with a cardboard box on their head. The kids were creative!
One person has this idea to thin the herd: “Maybe make the bicycle parade a longer distance on each end.”
We should combine Stupid Bike Night and Passport to Pain. You can only participate if you are willing to traverse 80 miles on your bike made from a screen door.
Others have a suggestion that is consistent with the way I was parented: “More kids more fire.” (My dad has said of babysitting his grandchildren and letting them roughhouse: “I stop at first blood.”)
One mom in the comments says, “Don’t worry, I’m going to spend the next 361 days making sure my kids practice their fire skills so by next year they can juggle torches and burn your patience at the same time.”
That’s good parenting. Teach your kids a super cool skill out of pure spite. That’s why I’m teaching my kids to make graffiti tags.
Someone points out the truth about our litigious society: “Don’t worry, one kid’s gonna get burned and then I’ll shut the whole thing down”
To which someone responds: “what are you Debbie Doener?” I know this is probably a typo, but now I can only think about döner kebab, the world’s most delicious food. There should be a döner cart at stupid bike night.
One commenter sums up the ethos of every facebook post and comment ever. We really could just replace the whole page with this one quote.“It was a whole lot cooler when it was a whole lot cooler.”
Besides hating our greatest local cultural moments, we also hate how we drive.
We have the following post.
I got caught up in the imagery of the first sentence and had trouble following the rest of it. It seems like maybe they’re complaining about the woman in the leopard-print blouse. But that can’t be right. People who wear cool clothes are inherently blameless.
But some people don’t let her cool outfit interfere with their witchcraft. Many islanders add their custom hexes to the mix.
One says, “I hope she finds a banana of unknown origin forgotten for an indeterminate time…at the bottom of her kid’s backpack and that the gasket on her upright washing machine consistently smells mildly of dog. And may Mother Nature grace her yard with a bloom of joyously mating winged termites after the next rain…”
Another: “You forgot to add ‘I hope you run into everyone you’ve ever known at Thriftway and you are stuck in there forever’” This sounds awesome. That’s how I socialize without having to go through the ordeal of making plans.
A third: “’I hope two people who haven’t seen each other in 50 years run into each other at Thriftway in front of you.’”
And a fourth curse: “I hope they get a rock in their shoe, but when they take off their shoe, they can’t find it, and then they put their shoe back on, and it’s still in there, and then they take off their shoe again, and they still can’t find it, so they reach under the sole, and it’s gross, and they still can’t find it, and then they put their shoe back on again, and it’s still in there.”
This poor woman will never know a day’s peace.
Perhaps all my bad luck stems from a time I drove poorly, and the wizard I cut off in traffic hexed me to always have a back ache, and to always be woken up by a horny rooster crowing, and to never be able to get my floor clean no matter how often I sweep it.
One commenter thinks it’s a bad idea to describe what people look like, because then they’ll change their whole style to avoid detection. They say, “Not people actually describing what they look like and what they’re wearing, what’s the point they’re probably never gonna wear that shirt again” No! That outfit sounds amazing! Please, whoever you are, don’t stop wearing it. If you need, I’ll wear the same thing to throw people off. I already have the glasses. All I need is the strength of character to pull off leopard print.
As gorgeous as leopard print is, we unfortunately have to move on to something ugly.
We’ve talked about graffiti before, and usually it’s just people complaining about Spring Break or Bad Dad. (Side note. I told my kids how I like the painting on that particle board near IGA that says Awesome Mom, and my ten-year-old pointed out that it was a response to the Bad Dad graffiti around town. I had not realized this!) But now we have graffiti that warrants discussion of both its message and aesthetics.
There are two interpretations of this. Some people see just the swastika and react to it. One says: “This is what happens when extremism is let out of the box. This is what happens when social beliefs are passed on to the next generation.”
Others assume it has the opposite meaning. One says,: “It clearly shows ‘not allowed’” in reference to the red circle around it and line through it. I tend to agree with this interpretation. Maybe next time the vandal could leave a note beside it, like those cards next to paintings in a museum.
The first commenter responds: “Irregardless of what the message is, poor parenting led to children who think defacing public property is Ok. There is no defense for that or whether the message is positive or negative.”
Before we get to the meat of the discussion about swastikas and crossed-out swasticas, we have to have the discussion we always have when there’s graffiti: Parents suck and anytime a child does something thoughtless or annoying, it is because parents have failed them, and thus society as a whole. But why are we always blaming parents when we could be blaming teachers?
One commenter says: “Drawing Nazi signs does not necessarily come from the parents. Some high school boys think it’s clever to draw and display them.”
There’s a strand of cruelty and nihilism in our culture where people like getting a rise out of other people by saying offensive things. It’s the whole premise of shows like South Park, and some people have entirely replaced their personalities with this drive to piss off and trigger people. (My mind instantly goes to congresswomen Nancy Mace and Marjorie Taylor Greene. If they stopped saying things just for the joy of making people angry, what would be left of them? Probably nothing. They would turn to vapor and dissipate in the breeze.)Teenage boys who have this South Park/Mace personality have spent their formative years on websites like 4Chan, and have decided that empathy is dumb and cruelty is funny. And then, every so often, one of these irony-poisoned people who thinks suffering is funny brings a gun to school.
So there are dark threads in our culture that need to be addressed.
But to get back to the graffiti- it looks to me like there is clearly a red circle around it showing that it is anti-nazi. I’m not sure how so many people are missing this. It’s basic semiotics. It clearly means no Nazis, which is a sentiment I agree with. However, this graffiti is so slapdash that it’s just sad. Some people give critiques. One says, “I would have picked a brighter red.”
Someone sees it as a story in two acts, three if you include the facebook post about it. “I would imagine two people painting it. The original lowlife who painted the swastika and the person who created the universal symbol for no. In any case, it needs to be painted over.”
Now I get to play the Jew card and say my thoughts on a crossed-off swastika. I agree with the commenter who said, “That’s a lousy way to make an anti- Nazi statement. Better to eradicate the Nazi sign completely.” I would really rather not see swasticas.
A better messaging would be something illuminating how people suffer from state violence, or envisioning a better world that we could have. This is just ugly.
Here’s an example of graffiti that isn’t ugly and has a message:
And here is my favorite graffiti of all time:
Basically, naziism is ugly and cruel. Instead of putting a red line through it, make something beautiful and meaningful instead.
Let’s switch to a happier topic. We have this post:
One person says, “In Guatemala it’s Santiago de Atitlan Vashon’s sister city” Sweet! And Guatemala is right next door to Japan!
One person tells us: “If you’re visiting Japan make sure you stop by the Vashon Bar and Grill! Absolutely wonderful people. It’s in Tokyo. and yes, it is specifically named after Vashon. The couple that owns it fell in love with the island and decided to name their business after us!”
I looked into it, and it’s real! But unfortunately, it’s permanently closed : (
Looks like I’ll have to go to Guatemala if I want to get some good Vashon cuisine.
But luckily, if I want a new toilet, I don’t have to travel. Someone is offering this:
Caption: just give it a month and the blackberry brambles will grow over it and bury it.
It’s nicer than the toilet that was at my kids’ bus stop for a week.
People are also giving away sinks and faucets, so you could deck out an entire half bath with road-plumbing.
Although free road toilets are in abundant supply, some things are missing from the island. One person poses this question:
People have the following complaints, and I will try to help them find the service they need.
“Cellphones.” -You can have mine, I’m sick of getting calls.
“Everything.” -They sell everything bagels at Thriftway.
“Less tourist stores!” -Ah yes, the perennial problem of wanting more less.
“Water taxi” –Wait, what? It runs all day and now also Saturdays.
“Carnival rides.” -They even got rid of the seesaw at the park. But, if you feel the urge to be filled with adrenaline and the sense that your life is about to end, might I recommend using the crosswalk at the four way intersection?
“Car wash” -Just wait until high schoolers need to raise money for prom, then there’ll be one at IGA.
“Private ferry services” -It’s called a canoe.
“Proper grammar and spelling are in short supply.” -I can’t help with this. Just blame parents and teachers.
Finally, it appears my golden retriever has been logging on and posting while I’m asleep.
Author: Anna Shomsky
I'm a former teacher and a data engineer living on Vashon Island. My writing has appeared in Five on the Fifth, Broken Spine, Women on Writing and on the Post-Culture Podcast. I wrote and produced the radio show Whispers of Vashon for 101.9 KVSH. I’ve had short stories published in the anthologies Island Stories and Chicken Scratchings, as well as through the Open Space Literary Project.
