Is Someone In Danger?

DEAR GEORGE: Because of being isolated during the pandemic, I find myself seeking social contact by paying more attention to my neighbors’ conversations on our local NextDoor website. While much of the discussion is about dog poops, lost pets, or people not shoveling their sidewalks, every now and then there is a topic which grabs my attention. This happened the other day when Janelle P. posted a comment titled, “Is someone in danger?” Janelle explained that she regularly drives by a local home that has an American flag flying upside down from the flagpole. It makes her uneasy but she’s not comfortable knocking on the door to check it out. She wonders if it’s a silent call for help. Perhaps someone who is being abused or is being held captive. Since it’s illegal to fly an American flag upside down, it could well be a life or death situation. Danny D. replied promptly, explaining that an upside down flag is a “universal sign of distress”, just like SOS. He agreed with Janelle that flying the flag that way is a very serious issue. He suggested law enforcement needs to do a wellness check on the owner and the property. Not everybody agreed with this suggestion however. Pete J. said that with all the unarmed people getting killed by police who come to their door, calling the police should be a last resort. Martha K. thought it better to call the VFW or the DAR. Jason B. suggested asking a concerned neighbor to check, saying, “Hey I wanted to make sure you’re aware your flag is upside down.” Malcolm L. said that years ago his grandmother’s neighbor, who was a veteran, hung his flag out every morning. When he hung it upside down one morning, his neighbors were worried. They checked on him and found he’d had a stroke, probably just as he was hanging the flag. Thank goodness the neighbors checked. Apparently confused, Peggy G asked, “What exactly is the purpose of this post? I’m trying to figure out how it helps our neighborhood.” Linda K. simply concluded, “The USA is in trouble.” Janelle then updated her original post, reporting that she did call the police and asked them to do a wellness check. According to Janelle, “the dispatcher made it obvious she thought I was a little crazy…and maybe I am.” Alex P. said, “Good Job Janelle!” The discussion took an abrupt turn when Martha S. reported that she knows of two houses on her street that fly the American flag upside down in response to Biden being elected president. It is their way of saying that our country is in distress. Max J. said he has no use at all for the protest message, but he doesn’t deny their freedom to express their opinion. A lot of other people agreed with this. Bobby R. then revealed that he hangs his flag upside down. “It’s to symbolize our countries distress becuase we no longer have a democracy since the election was clearly hacked and stolen. Dark times we live in.” Bobby’s disclosure pretty much ended the discussion, and Janelle cancelled the thread, noting that 50% of her neighbors think her a quack job and 50% think her observant and caring. She thanked all for their opinions and helpful suggestions. I was sorry the conversation came to an end, but the mystery had been solved. LOVE, DAVE

A Touch of Winter

DEAR GEORGE: We got our first real dose of winter this week, a storm that brought in ten inches of snow on Wednesday, then one or two more on Thursday. I always find this exciting. It takes me back to childhood in the Upper Peninsula. Snowmen, forts, snowball fights, sledding, snow-shoeing on the river. Iko, who has spent most of his life in New Orleans, finds the snow puzzling, but I think he likes it all right. Here are some photos of our neighborhood in the snow. LOVE, DAVE

Less Drama Please

DEAR GEORGE, Sometimes it seems like our lives have become completely bland and uneventful. I get up late, walk the dog, eat a bowl of Raisin Crunch, read the newspaper, scan my e-mails, revise a few poems, check MSNBC, have supper with Katja, watch Netflix, walk the dog one last time, and go back to bed. That’s it, one day after the next. Lately, though, things have picked up. Most notably, we set out for the grocery store on a dark, drizzly night last week. My windshield wipers were malfunctioning, and I had trouble seeing the road. Two blocks from home we came upon a cluster of emergency vehicles with blazing lights on both sides of the street. I slowed to a crawl and started driving between them. Suddenly I saw a police officer about eight feet directly in front of me, waving his arms frantically and with a horrified look on his face. I jammed on the brakes and came to a stop a few feet away from him. When I opened my window, another police officer was screaming at me. “Back up, back up, get out of here!” I did as commanded. However, I still feel jittery about the incident. I almost ran over a police officer; I got yelled at by another police officer; and I used bad judgment to try to drive through an emergency zone in the first place.

A few days later I went downstairs to give Iko his morning walk, and what did I find attached to our kitchen door but an Accident Report Form from an Officer Schneider. It listed all the information about another driver and his car, along with the date of the accident (that very morning) and the location (our home address). I couldn’t imagine what this was about since we’d just gotten up, much less had time to be driving anywhere and getting in an accident. I wondered if it was a prank. A while later we got a call from our gardener who had talked with Officer Schneider. It turned out that a young driver had tried to make a turn at our corner at a high rate of speed and lost control of his car. He knocked down the pedestrian walk light pole on our sidewalk, plowed through our garden, and crashed head-on into the sturdy honeysuckle tree that is a mere six inches from the front of our house. The police officer said that the car was completely totaled. The seat-belted driver amazingly escaped serious injury. According to the police officer, had it not been for our sturdy honeysuckle tree, the car would have demolished the front wall of our house and wound up in our living room.

We’ve been craving more excitement in our lives, but now I’m more into appreciating peace and serenity. Hopefully our lives will stay boring for a while. LOVE, DAVE