Flag

It’s been over two weeks since the Confederate flag came down off the South Carolina capitol building. Since then, I keep seeing confederate flags in the back of pickup trucks. Flag bumper stickers, flag t-shirts, flag murals, flag hats. Always been here but especially conspicuous now. Hard not to read the recent uptick as a big “fuck you” to liberals and blacks and gays and anybody who gets in the way. Like the “fuck you” I got from the young man after he backed his truck, fast, on a blind turn, ignoring my honks. He pulled right up to me before pulling slowly into a makeshift parking space. He didn’t back in or make any signal. When I pulled up alongside him, he looked over and sneered his defiance: “Fuck you.” He could have cared less. Or what about the quiet “fuck you” from the man sitting in the dog park listening to me talk to the gay couple who live down the street? How he walked away in disgust. Or the “fuck you” from the woman who laughed in my face as she steered into my lane, texting, and had to swerve to keep from hitting me. Or or or…. I refuse to agree that we’re back in a civil war again. The flag needed to come down, plain and simple. It’s time to move on. You can have your “fuck you” flag and you can swear with it all you want. Just leave me out of it.