Not a Frying Pan!

Yesterday was Eucharist at my church. During service, I was wandering around the grounds to survey the situation. I was also looking for someone to bum me a cigarette. As I turned the corner near the security guard, I noticed he was speaking over the railing with two men sitting at the bus stop, so I walked up to them and offered them some quarters in trade for some nicotine. They didn't have cigarettes, but one of them offered me a few hits off of his vape in trade for the quarters, so I took it, and he asked me to sit down next to him.

They asked me if I had any money, and I told them, "no, that was the last few quarters I had." They asked me if I had a job or if I was trying to make money, and I said, "yeah, I was just evicted and I'm staying on a couch nearby, and I really do need to make money."

He pulled out his little crack pipe and told me he was a dealer and asked me if I had ever tried crack cocaine. "Yeah, I've tried it." I admitted.
"Well did you like it?" He asked, giving me a knowing look. I gave him a flat look. "Come on, it's crack cocaine."

He and his buddy were pretty amused by that answer. The one with the crack pipe said he was going to remember that because he got a kick out of it.

"Well have you ever been down to the Blade?"
"What's that?"
"You know, the Blade where the prostitutes walk."
"Oh, like the Strip?"
"Yeah. My guy right here is a pimp if you need some protection."
I leveled with them then and there. "No, I've worked as a hooker before. I didn't like it, so I don't care to start up again-"

Just then, a guy from across the street -a food pantry regular- started shouting. He wore a giant pair of silver headphones, his sweater tucked into his sweatpants and his sweatpants tucked into his socks. In one hand he had a huge knife and a can of baked beans; in the other, a 12-inch frying pan.

"You've been at that bus stop all morning! Get a move on!" He shouted.
"We're waiting for the bus, lay off!" said the dealer.
The man across the street grew irate. He obviously wasn't playing. He demanded that they get out of his neighborhood. As the intensity of the situation grew, I realized that I didn't want to be in the middle of their street fight, and I thanked the dealer for his nicotine, and backed away from the situation to watch it from the safety of the cathedral steps.

The man with the frying pan kept walking towards them on the other side of traffic, sometimes getting halfway across and stopping traffic in the process. As the situation unfolded, I repeatedly attempted to focus the guard's attention to the real threat- the two men propositioning me for prostitution.

"I know the man with the frying pan. He is on the church steps at the pantry every day. He knows something is wrong with the situation."

The guard nodded at me, and pulled out his phone to call the police. "The man with the frying pan understands something about this situation," I reiterated, but the guard was too focused on frying pan guy's unconventional and chaotic methods. Still, I felt like the only person in that situation looking out for me was the one the security guard was determined to vilify because of how disruptive it was.

Since I wasn't getting anywhere with the guard, I decided it was time for me to remove myself from that situation and go back into the service. After service, I went back over to the security guard to ask him what ended up happening.

"The guy with the frying pan ended up hitting someone's car with his frying pan. I called the cops so maybe they'll catch him doing something stupid. That's the hope anyways," he explained. That response really frustrated me because it felt like he was criminalizing the one person who had my back in that moment. I rolled my eyes and just left, frustrated that the security guard didn't seem to actually care about understanding the situation or about my safety.

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