What the Fuck is Wrong with People?

I’m sick of this shit happening to me.

It was 8:15 a.m., and I was making good time heading home after having just left the radio station at eight. As I pulled to a stop at the underpass at Rock and the off-ramp from I-80 eastbound, I saw a Black man crossing the intersection and walking east.

We made eye contact, and I smiled, nodding a hello while he remained stone-faced. It was my first indication that something was not right.

Suddenly he started calling me slurs as he rushed the side of my truck, and realizing I was about to be robbed, assaulted, or worse, I started rolling my window up. I was not fast enough as he slammed his meaty right fist into the upper left side of my head.

Fortunately, his knuckles caught the upper edge of my truck’s window frame, slowing the punch considerably. In the meantime, I continued rolling my window up.

The punch caused me to lose contact with the brake pedal, and I rolled back about five feet, nearly backing into the car behind me. My assailant was standing in front of my truck when I popped the clutch, and it jumped forward violently.

Stepping on the gas pedal so I didn’t end up stalled and further assaulted, I hit the man with the left front bumper, bouncing him into the intersection. Then I gunned it against the red light.

Pulling into the nearby fire station, I rolled down my window and asked one of the firefighters I saw to call the police. The woman behind me in the car followed me into the driveway, got out, and accused me of hit and run.

I ignored her by rolling up my window while waiting for a police officer.

It took only a minute or two, and a cruiser pulled in behind the woman still blustering on about me having committed hit and run. Still, I waited for the officer to come to my truck.

He sent the woman back to her car to sit and wait, then spoke to the firefighter who called before finally coming to my window, asking what was happening. I explained how the man had punched me in the head, and I had popped the clutch in a panic and hit him before driving straight to the fire department to get help.

He asked, “What did he look like?”

I gave my description, and he said, “Wait, while I make a call.”

I was feeling the swelled lump on my head when he came back.

“We have everyone looking for this guy right now. Do you need an ambulance.”

“No, I’m fine, just a little bit shaken is all.”

I’ll be right back. I need to talk to this woman behind you.”

I could see he was trying to explain the situation to her, but she was arguing, insisting that she saw what had happened.

Finally, she left, and the officer returned to me.

“We got a couple of 9-1-1 calls about what happened. They corraberate your story.”

He had me fill out a report as they took photos of my head while waiting to see if they could find my assailant. Some 15 minutes later, the man still hadn’t been found, so I asked if I could head home.

“Sure, and maybe get an ice pack on that knot,” he said. “You know, it’s too bad you were sitting at one of the only stoplights in town without a surveillance camera.”

They still haven’t caught the mother fucker.