he day the terror alert hits Code Red starts out like
any other day.
People all across America wake up their normal times, the East
Coast rising first before the domino effect of stacked time zones
pulls the rest of the country out of bed.
People drink instant coffee and smear fingers with newspaper
ink.
Police are vigilant, on the lookout for suspicious activity.
First grade teachers are preparing lessons on the letter C.
It is a Tuesday.
As a direct result of Code Red, on Saturday of that week, I
lose my best friend in a horse racing tragedy.
At 11:31 a.m.
EST, 8:31 a.m. PST, all major television and radio news networks
and about a million Internet news sources
break in with the announcement that shakes America’s foundation—for
the first time in its relatively brief life of three years (though
that’s close to 30 in human fear years), the terror alert
hits Code Red. Good Day Philadelphia tells me, with grave voices
and jittery eyes, before reminding that although this is a major
moment in U.S. history and understandably gives people plenty
of reasons to be scared, we should try and remain calm at least
during this important message from one of their sponsors, Braidicks’ Home
Security Systems.
Almost immediately after the announcement, FOXNews
changes its name to CODEREDNews. They give updates every fourteen
minutes
on the status of the alert and what measures the government
is taking to combat the red menace. An extensive list is released
by the security team listing the most probable targets for
homeland
attacks. The American people are third on the list, topped
only by large buildings and the Hollywood sign.
Though admittedly frightened, most Americans are fine with
their place on the list.
My best friend, Peppercorn, goes to
the horse track almost every day. He’s a good gambler, meaning he makes more money
than he loses, which is about as good as it gets in that line.
But it isn’t—necessarily—always about the money.
He often repeats the gamblers’ motto, which takes me a
while to understand: “The next best thing to gambling and
winning is gambling and losing.”
Street vendors set up shop
on corners throughout the country, selling hastily put together
shirts that both signal the apocalypse—“The
END is Here”—and those that remark “I survived
Code Red.” The shirts are plain white and have the slogans
scrawled in lipstick or jam. Most buyers don’t care. They
just want to commemorate this time in history and do their patriotic
duty by spending money.
The sellers remark on how they wish every day could be Code
Red day.
Braidicks’ Home Security Systems is enjoying its most
prosperous week since it reopened after that ugly video-camera-in-people’s-bathrooms
scandal. Business is up almost a thousand percent. Their slogan, “Someone’s
Gotta Protect You,” becomes the catchphrase of the year,
used profusely by politicians and NRA representatives alike.
Peppercorn is one of the most pragmatic people I’ve ever
met. Which is odd, I assume, for a gambler, as he must know that
the odds are often stacked against him. He tells me not to worry,
that we must keep living our lives the same way we’ve been
living them, that it isn’t our business to uproot in any
way time’s train tracks. We’re just experiencing
some turbulence, and if we wander down to the drink car and throw
a few back, before we know it, everything will work out. It’s
a great plan in theory, and I half believe it.
Each day that
the blaring specter of Code Red watches over us seems to pack
much more into its 24 hours than any preceding
day. Casual conversations once limited to “How are you
doing?” “Fine.” “That’s super,” are
now replaced with, “How about that Code Red?” “Yeah.” “I
got my t-shirt for $10.” “Really? A guy on 84th Street
is selling them for $8,” “Oh. I won’t walk
that far. It’s more than two blocks from my house. Something
bad might happen.”
Thursday—CODEREDNews is losing
ratings to other sources. A tropical storm is brewing off the
coast of South Carolina.
CODEREDNews names it Hurricane Qaeda and promises that a camera
will be placed inside the eye to provide in-depth coverage.
Their ratings soar.
On Friday, a solidarity rally is organized
all around the country to show the rest of the world who they’re dealing with.
Not a nation of Finger Lakes and cracked alliances, but one under
God and indivisible, who won’t take shit from nobody.
In Philadelphia, as I imagine the case is in most major cities,
the marchers are felt, not just heard. A river of thousands fills
the streets and sidewalks, walks around and right over cars.
There are even marchers in wheelchairs.
The building in which I work is one block from City Hall, the
marchers’ rallying point. From my office window, I watch
them gather in the wide, one way, three-lane city street below.
Many carry flowers, hand them to anyone they see, leave them
on cars and in doors and in windows. Waiting for the marchers
is a band of city police, on horse and foot, with riot gear.
The Mountain Dew people are on hand en masse distributing free
samples of Code Red drink and pamphlets quoting doctors who say
caffeine and pure cane sugar found in Code Red are crucial for
the well-being of marchers and rallyers, especially when marching
and rallying during a Code Red.
After almost ten minutes, the last marchers pass under my window.
These people are moving faster than everyone else who’s
already passed. This is a problem, because nobody from the rear
stops when they’re supposed to. The inertia is awesome.
The pied pipers in front don’t see it coming, though
there isn’t a thing they could have done had they been
alerted. The wave of people overtakes them and swallows up the
police, and there is confusion all around.
Once surrounded, the police react. Full of fear and loathing,
they shove back with malice and mace. A sprayed protestor begins
swinging his fists, and punches a horse in the mouth. The horse
jerks its head and kicks its back foot out, hitting in the small
of her back a nineteen-year old girl holding a clarinet, knocking
out four of her front teeth, two on top and two on bottom. Now-out-of-control
protestors see the girl on the ground and converge around the
police; Mountain Dew cans and plastic bottles hurled from the
middle of the rally’s pack land all around. Some marchers
run around, trying to get everybody in order; the really peaceful
people scurry to safety.
Police officers chop through the crowd with their batons as
if going through a jungle with a machete. Whenever they reach
a smaller individual, make eye contact, and see fear, they throw
him or her up against the nearest car or wall. With a knee in
the back, the officer handcuffs, frisks, cops a feel, and arrests.
If there’s no car or wall handy, the concrete is fine.
Protestors who fight back do so like mujaheddin, run-by random
attacks, not necessarily caring about who they’re attacking
or why they’re doing it, just sure of themselves and satisfied
with that.
The most bewildered out of the entire crowd are, without a
doubt, the police horses. They can’t understand the whirlwind
around them; they’re being yanked one way and another by
their riders. They whinny their distress, but nobody listens.
The newswoman live on the scene provides play-by-play coverage.
Constantly brushing aside the wisps of dyed blonde hair that
wave in front of her eyes, she motions behind her—never
looking away from the camera, so as not to ruin the personal
connection with the viewer—every few seconds to make sure
people know when to take their eyes off of her and look at what
she is reporting on. When she says “The peaceful march
has now turned into what looks like a bloody and brutal mess
of frustrations, emotions, and revolution,” there are traces
of fear in her voice, though the quavering could just be sexual
exhilaration.
Incidentally, the rest of the world ignores the
rally. Those that don’t aren’t too surprised at the
outcome.
Peppercorn calls me Saturday morning and asks if I want
to go to the track.
“C’mon, it’ll be fun. Have something to eat,
place a few bets, watch the horses. Take your mind off of all
this Code Red nonsense. Remember, money won is twice as sweet
as money earned.”
“Yeah, but something bad might happen.”
“Oh, what are the odds of something bad happening at
the track? This is Philadelphia Park, not Hollywood or Santa
Anita. It’s a longshot, ninety-nine to one at best. Besides,
I got a tip on a horse that’s running in the fourth race. ”
So I pull myself out of the house and meet Peppercorn at the
track. On the subway ride to the track, I can’t help but
notice the calmness. On the streets. On people’s faces.
In the air. But there’s still a something on edge; everything
reminds me of the moment just before a sneeze.
By the time I got there, Peppercorn was already at his favorite
spot, right next to the gate where the horses come in and out.
He loves looking at the horses, though I believe he enjoys the
horses looking back at him even more. “They’re not
too far from human, you know.” As if to prove his point,
when the number eight horse, Greek Mystique, is announced, the
equine goes into a little shuffle. I have to admit that it’s
pretty cool, and for the first time this week, I forget about
Code Red.
It’s a few minutes before the fourth race, and I’m
thirsty. When I tell Peppercorn I’m going to get something
to drink, he hands me a twenty and tells me to bet ten to win
on the six horse and give him a ten dollar exacta straight paired
with the one horse.
I’m only gone a few minutes, but as I make my way back
to Peppercorn and the gate, the impending sneeze I felt earlier
comes full blast. As the horses are in the chutes, the substitute
track announcer, who is only working because the regular guy
was injured—not physically, but psychologically—during
the rally, presses the emergency evacuation alarm instead of
the bell signaling the start of the race, and the jockeys run
the horses right off of the track and into the stalls. Two jockeys
are making calls on their cell phones—one telling his wife
to have the kids and emergency bags packed for when he gets home;
the other, who doesn’t have a family, telling his stockbroker
to sell everything and ship all monies into an account in Northern
Peru—and neither jockey sees Peppercorn. The horses whinny
that somebody is in the way, but the riders pay them no mind.
They don’t know that they’ve crushed Peppercorn until
it’s reported in the next day’s racing forum. At
Sunday’s opening, there is a moment of silence before the
first race, which comes out 3-9-2 and pays $243.50 for a $1 straight
trifecta.
Peppercorn’s funeral three days later is on the same day
that the alert is lifted, thus ending a harrowing seven days
of exaggeration, overreaction, and far too many confused horses.
Now, for many, there’s joy in the streets, because it only
makes sense for survivors to celebrate a disaster. But even though
I’m technically a survivor of Code Red, I don’t feel
like celebrating. As I walk home from the cemetery somebody hands
me a free t-shirt saying “Code What? Code Who?” All
horses and their jockeys and trainers are absolved of Peppercorn’s
death, as all accidents caused by Code Red, as long as they don’t
affect large buildings or the Hollywood sign, are excused.
Two
days after the funeral, one of the major network’s
new hit, Reality T.V., a reality show which gives the viewer
backstage coverage of creating a reality show, is interrupted
by an important message from the Department of Land and Home
Security. A new level, Code Here it Comes, has been added to
the terror alert. They profess that since Code Red represented
an “imminent attack,” and once it was on no attack
followed, there must be something higher. Code Here it Comes
will only be activated during an attack, thereby covering all
the bases.
The next Saturday, exactly one week after Peppercorn
was crushed, I find myself sitting at home watching the since-restored
FOXNews.
With the furor and excitement of Code Red now in the distant
past, it is up to the newscasters to whirl people into a frenzy.
Exactly three minutes into the broadcast, the dapper weather
reporter, he of the slicked back black hair and light reflective
green suit, reports on severe thunderstorms heading our way.
He punctuates each sentence with a closed fist like a judge
slamming down a gavel, and tells people to by all means worry,
because
there is no substitute for preparation. Before he throws it
back to Sue, he reminds us that there is a 100% chance that the
thunderstorms
may cause flooding, and urges that shoppers get out as quickly
as they can to stock up on most non- and selected perishables.
[END]
© 2004 Daniel J. DiPrinzio - Contributor's
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