A Little Girl Died Here Because No One would Help Her

This took the cake. When this happened, I knew Modesto had gone for a trip in a handbasket, and I would have to move away to some place civilized, like maybe Appalachia, or the Australian outback, or at least the Modoc Plateau.

Somebody's cute, sweet little, just-turned-teenager received a clandestine birthday gift. It was death in an aerosol can, given to her specifically for her to toke on the noxious propellants. She toked on this street corner and the propellants noxiated her here.

At that point, the poor little dudette had no choice but to keel over in the gutter and die there. It took maybe a moment for her friends to figure out that their friend wasn't faking anything this time, but once they knew it, they begged all passersby for all they were worth, to please stop and help her, or at least call for help. They begged like that for most of an hour.

Long after she was dead, and her friends had lost all but the tiniest hope, they continued to beg, because they'd learned too late that there was only one of that particular friend of theirs, they'd never have another of her, and they couldn't have her back.

Finally, someone called 911. No, it wasn't some kindly soul who called for help for this little girl. No, it was just some annoyed, uncaring road hog who couldn't stand to share the street with juvenile pedestrians, and he wanted the police to go make those children get out of the street. Never mind that one of them was laying dead in the gutter, he just wanted them removed.

So the children had to wait until the police got there, to tell someone who was responsible enough to start CPR and call an ambulance.

Guess what Modesto? Emergencies are urgent. Children are people too. When they die, they're just as dead as anyone else who dies. When people need help, that's when they need it, not when it doesn't inconvenience you.

Guess what else Modesto? Where a person is dying is where they will die, if you won't help them. If she's laying in the gutter, and you can't be bothered to even stop and move her, in the filthy gutter is where she will die.

No, I wasn't one of those children. I was older, and didn't know any of the children involved, or their families, but I had learned elsewhere what it was like to wake up from a nightmare, only to remember the reality, and wish I could be back asleep, having the nightmare, instead. And I knew I wouldn't be able to cope with living in a Modesto that had become this.