We were standing on our ward's main corner, holding signs, letting all the cars now where we stand and reminding them to vote Yes on Prop 8. Normally the Yes crowd has 3 corners and a couple No voters stand on a different corner- tonight we stood at the same corner. Everything was going normal, people are either happy and give a thumbs up, honking like crazy for us or they give a different finger and drive by saying mean things. No big deal, we are used to this. Darrin decides to go stand on another corner with others waving signs while I stayed on the main corner with Colby. On the main corner there is about 20 Yes sign holders and about 8 No sign holders. The Yes sign holders are spread out on all sides of the corner and the No sign holders are in the middle. Yes, it is uncomfortable to be a few feet away from someone who has a different view but everyone is as respectful as they can be.
About an hour into this, a guy shows up late 20's and starts swearing up a storm. He is using the f bomb in so many ways I didn't know what to think of him. He comes up and starts to shove some of the Yes signs out of peoples hands and rips others up. Next, he goes to the No's and starts cussing them out and while doing that he shoves one of the No sign holders so hard that this kid falls backwards on to his back. We are standing on concrete, it looked like it really hurt. Now everyone is dumbfounded are starting to get really scared. All of the guys are trying to tell this guy to calm down, while doing this he shoves one of the Yes guys into the street where cars were driving. Luckily no cars hit him, they all slammed on their breaks. The guy who shoved him looked like he was going to kick him and than a whole bunch of guys were grabbing at this guy and trying to hold him back. Luckily no one was hurt! Everyone was so confused by this guy; he didn't even have a specific side he was upset with. After this happened we were waiting on the police to get down here and figure all of this out while the guys were watching this guy so he doesn't get away. While all eyes were on this guy Darrin ran over and saw the drunk guy's friend back in the background with a switchblade, and kept flashing it like deciding if he was going to use it. Darrin seemed to be the only person who saw the knife so he kept an eye on him until the police showed up. The police took a while to show up so when they got there the cops went for the drunk guy first. Darrin saw the guy with the knife start walking away so he grabbed one of the officers and they ran after him. Once they caught up to him he threw the guy on the ground and started to cuff him. It turns out that the guy must have hid the knife somewhere so the cops could not find it. The cops then took the two guys away and we eventually went home. It turned out to be one of the scariest things ever. Crazy! Even though this was the craziest thing I have ever witnessed I'm thankful that it didn't get so out of hand that someone got hurt. I am glad everyone was okay! All I can say is ONE more day!
Posted in:
2008,
darrin,
riss
on
Monday, November 3, 2008
at