Things which have not changed (1) -- continued

Crime (again)

An aside: if crime, per se, feels to me to be about the same (or even a little reduced), then the awareness of crime is heightened. People just seem to think about it more.

Why? I'm not certain. The media may report about it more aggressively now. Maybe that has something to do with it. And the 'Net means everyone knows everything the instant it happens. And, finally, there's Breaking Bad, the hit TV program set in this City, and which has to do with a chemistry teacher who becomes a methamphetamine dealer. (It's also going off the air shortly. Wonder how that will effect things.)

But one of the responses of the new awareness is that there are now gated communities here, which didn't exist when I lived in the city the first time. Now, you will find them all over Albuquerque, and particularly in the two eastern quadrants of the city.

One of them is directly across the street from my apartment. It is rather impressive, actually, a little reminiscent of a walled city, something out of the Middle Ages. A tall white brick wall circles it—over six feet tall in some places—and there are gates and guard posts at each entry way. Over the tops of the wall, or through the iron bars of the gates, you may glimpse the tall roofs of rather luxurious suburban homes.

So safe. So strong. So secure.

Yet…

*

The other day, I was out jogging. I saw ahead of me two teenage boys. Good kids. Just a couple of lads walking home from school or maybe the big Church just down the way. They were tall. I suspected they played basketball. But their sport of choice at that particular moment involved a small, hard rubber ball that they bounced between themselves as they walked.

The inevitable happened, of course. One of the boys threw the ball a little harder than he should have. It arced up into the sky and then over the white wall into the Gated Community.

Neither boy hesitated a moment. They simply hopped over the wall…as easily as if it were a curb…retrieved their toy, and hopped back over again. They headed on their way up the street, nodding shyly at me when I passed them and smiled.

Admittedly, they were athletic boys. Long legged boys. But, the point is the same. If they could get over the wall (and this was one of the places where it is at its tallest), then so could someone else.



*

But, the really interesting part of my story comes later.

Background: not long ago, the city had a bit of a scandal. A high-flying local real estate developer, Douglas F. Vaughan, was running a very lucrative business. He offered his family and friends, and wealthy customers, the opportunity to invest in his operations. And, at first, everyone seemed to profit. He was a magician, people said, at real estate.

Of course, it was a Ponzi scheme. People lost millions before it was all done and said. Vaughan went to jail and was duly dubbed Albuquerque's very own "Mini-Madoff."

The connection to my story? Well, before his fall, Vaughan built himself a palatial estate…a huge house, with bedroom upon bedroom, bath upon bath, garage after garage…all furnished, of course, in the best of taste.

And where was this estate? This house from which a genuine criminal mastermind directed the systematic looting of bank accounts across the city?

Where else? The very gated community that is across from me. It nestles in among the other homes of other (though more honest) affluent men and women.

And there, of course, is the irony. The good people of the Gated Community built their little city and gave it walls to seal away the contagions of the age.
Only, all along, a thief greater and more voracious then any they could have imagined…was right there among them.

Like the viper at the breast. The disease in the blood. The cancer in the cell.

Such is the illusion of safety. The true efficacy of walls.