Decency

I was thinking about decency today…

Somebody in Yakima owns a very dirty station wagon. Somebody else decided to write a note in the filth on the back window. Rather than the standard “Wash Me!” or the more humorous “Do Not Wash… Scientific Experiment Underway” the messenger chose language dirtier than the window itself: “Wash Me Bitch!!”

The offending car, with the offending message, was parked in front of the public library downtown. Along came a bus full of third- and fourth-graders on a field trip to the library, stopping, as chance would have it, next to this vehicle. As the children stepped off the bus, it took only a few seconds for the first child to notice the vulgar writing, and soon a group of children was crowding at the window for their chance to see the message. The boys seemed to think it was funny. The girls did not.

I wonder whether the person who wrote those words ever considered who might read them. An act so seemingly insignificant – forming words on a car window – is not likely to prompt much thought. The writer must have had some sense of the words’ impact on the owner of the car. But beyond that? Would he or she have chosen the same words knowing they could be read by a neighbor, teacher, grandmother – or a bus full of children?

I was the last in the group to pass by the car window, and as I did I pushed my fingers through the grime, erasing the filthy word from view. It was the decent thing to do. But I couldn’t erase the word from those kids’ memories.

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