In The Blink Of An Eye

 

Cameraman captures explosion near Baghdad's Green Zone

A shopping plaza sits just off the highway in southern Atlanta's neighborhood of Camp Creek, an area that is almost all upper-middle income African American families.  It's on my way home from picking up my son from school, so we stop into Barnes & Noble to do his homework and maybe a quick breeze through the pet store to look at the reptiles; he's six.

On the way into the pet store a man crosses the parking lot and heads towards the store entrance as well.  My spider-sense starts to tingle, this guy doesn't belong.  He's white and disheveled looking, two things that make him stand out among the normal cliental.  He's not a laborer on his way home from work, and his gait is way too strong and purposeful. 

In an instant I switch over, my senses heighten, and I'm totally aware of EVERYTHING.  We enter the store and head to the back, moments later the man appears again, brushing past me as I move between him and my son.  As he walks up the isle away from me he does an odd little twitch with his right elbow that is a common tell-tale sign of someone that is carrying a gun that is not used to doing so. Time to go.  I grab my son by the hand, located the man in the store surveillance mirrors, and find the best way out to the car and away.  

In the car I tried to explain to my son why we left so quickly, but it was beyond him.  I took stock in how quickly I switched over, all of a sudden I was in Haiti, Baghdad, Colombia .  It all came on like a flash of light; skills, senses, angles, egress, contingencies, it was game-on in the blink of an eye.