The night before my Dad died, I knew it was gonna happen. And I went to the local bar about a mile up the road; I was there from 2pm with the plan to get smashed until the place closed at 2am. By midnight or so I had gone back inside—it has this big covered patio—to buy another drink.
I come out and there’s a random dude who said something funny and I actually laughed and said “lol brother” or something like that and went to go sit down. So this guy starts talking to me and I was like fuck, I invited this even though I don’t want to talk to anyone, so I’m polite, but also non inviting. “Don’t talk to me. Just reading my phone.” And at some point the guy says whatcha reading? Oh, just about current events/history. Reading about Putin?
This was 14 March 2022, and I had in fact been reading about Putin and the invasion of Ukraine, and so I’m like, “how do you know this unless you’d been reading my phone over my shoulder when I was last inside at the bar ordering my current drink.” my thoughts—didn’t say that quote out loud. So I said, “yeah, I’m reading about Putin.”
“What do you think about him.” At this point I’m like I have tried to get you to leave me alone politely so many times mother fucker and you’re still not getting it. What can I say that will upset you most. “We’ll if all the worst people on earth hate him, he must be doing something right.
Dude looked like he was having a mini-stroke.
How can you say that? He’s a murderer; he’s invaded a sovereign country. “How old are you son? Do you not recall us doing that? In any event it’s in the Soviet Union, both countries that were aiming nuclear missiles at me for the first 7 years of my life.”
“You can’t believe that; surely you must believe we should help the Ukrainians defend themselves?!”
Ok, think about it this way. Let’s do that. We risk starting a war. Bigger war than what’s going on now. Have you considered how many people will die? Have you ever watched a guy burn to death? Seen what a dude looks like after exsanguination? That means bled to death—they turn blue.
At this point he’s like, “oh, so you served?”
And to this day I cannot believe the tenor of this exchange. “Did I? What reason do you have to believe that?” Well you just said all these awful things.
You don’t think any civilian has ever seen these things? No firefighters? Nurses/emt’s? Why does it matter who you are talking to right now? The question is, have you thought about the horrors that might occur if the things you advocate happen? I’m not trying to get one over on you or pull a moral trump card. Pretend I don’t exist; have you thought about what you’re advocating.
Eventually he was like well if you haven’t served my family has! “My grandpa was in the Apollo program. He sent men to the moon!”
And I said, “that’s wonderful; what have you done?” And then he just stormed off. And I still don’t know where this guy went, because there was no easy walking path to the nearest neighborhood. So bizarre and hilarious experience. Still not sure it wasn’t a dream.
But to the extent I think this actually did happen and he did exist, it was an NPC come to life. The screens told him Ukraine war good, Russia bad. And he was frustrated and angry that someone who according to his narrative should be on his side—an American veteran—didn’t agree with his narrative. NPC didn’t know how to react to narrative discord.
And confronting someone over their failure to embrace the narrative was the primary objective of this thing. He should have been able if paying attention to see a man with tears in his eyes that didn’t want to talk to a stranger, but he felt compelled to carry on this conversation. Amazing. -Fin