I’m normally not the kind of guy who likes to draw attention to myself or my politics in public. There are no candidate bumper stickers on my car. I don’t wear political T-shirts, unless it’s something like “Save the Aquifer.” I don’t put up yard signs for candidates, though my wife sometimes does.
I try to keep my professional life and my social interactions separate, but it doesn’t always work. Often, when I’m introduced, people will say something like, “Oh, the Flyer guy. Yeah, I read your column.” Then there’s often a moment of frisson as I wait to check the vibe. I got a bad vibe the other night at a restaurant in Regalia Shopping Center, when the person I was introduced to said, “Oh, yeah … You’ve got a lot of opinions, don’t you?”
Yes, I do. Pleasure meeting you. See ya. Bye.
Anyway, as I said, I try to avoid such situations. So I don’t know what on Earth I was thinking last Saturday when I decided to wear a red baseball cap to Fresh Market. It looks exactly like a Trump MAGA cap, but the text reads:
MADE YA LOOK
BLACK LIVES MATTER
It was a gag gift from my wife and it has hung from my desk lamp at home for months. I can’t tell you why I suddenly thought it was a good idea to wear it.
When I got to the store and started walking across the parking lot, I realized that anyone more than 20 feet away would just assume I was wearing a MAGA hat. The joke only worked if the jokee was facing me and close enough to read the text. Oops. Nonetheless, I persevered, while noting as I grabbed a shopping cart, that the damn hat and people’s possible reactions to it was all I was thinking about.
First stop was at the berries display to pick up my weekly ration of blueberries. There was a Black guy putting out fresh plastic tubs, stacking them neatly. I saw his head jerk my way as he noticed my hat. I stared nonchalantly down at the produce, hoping the dude was reading my hat. He was.
“I like that hat,” he said, laughing. “You had me for a minute.”
“Oh yeah, this hat? Ha ha. It always gets a reaction,” I said, shamelessly. Ha ha. Phew.
I drew a couple of looks from people in the produce section, but no one was close enough to get the joke, so I was either just another dumb-ass Trumper or a fellow patriot, depending on their politics.
At the deli counter, I studied the array of roast chickens, head lowered, as if deep in concentration. The woman behind the counter made no comment. As I pointed at my selection, she handed it to me with an inscrutable smile and said, “Have a great day.” Bupkis.
It was then that I realized the stupid hat was wearing me, instead of the other way around. I might as well have been wearing a white Klan hood with “JUST KKKIDDING” on the forehead. Or a Confederate T-shirt with “I’M A LOSER” on the back. Some things just aren’t funny, even ironically. The MAGA hat has become too loaded with political baggage to be amusing any longer.
I took off the hat and stuffed it in one of my reusable shopping bags in the bottom of the cart. Which is ironic at some level, I suppose.
That evening, being on my own for the weekend, I went to Boscos in Overton Square for dinner. I like to sit at the cozy little bar, and I like their steak sandwiches. As soon as I sat down, I realized I’d seated myself in a combat zone. The Black woman to my left was arguing with a white guy across from her about Trump. “He emboldened people to be racist,” she said. “I can’t stand the man.”
“He did a lot of good things for the country,” the man said.
And so it went for a few minutes. I managed to get my order in, as the bartender rolled his eyes apologetically. Then I watched, unbelieving, as the two protagonists stared at each other silently for a moment, then walked around the bar and hugged. I wish I’d had my hat.
