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Thoughts on Jackson Police Officer James Bonneau almost a year later

Posted by Aaron - 29/01/11 at 11:01:07 pm

As I think back about the days immediately following the shooting, one conversation sticks with me. I didn’t have it. It wasn’t an interview I conducted, but one I overheard.

Jackson Police Officer James Bonneau was shot and killed just after midnight on March 9, 2009. About mid-afternoon that day, a woman called the newspaper and wanted to talk to a reporter about Officer Bonneau. Danielle Salisbury took the call.

The single mom lived in a not-so-nice part of the city and called the police frequently. Noises scared her, worried her. She kept an eye out for suspicious people and activity and called when she didn’t feel safe. Bonneau worked the night shift in her area and often came to her house.

She said he was always nice to her, re-assuring. He listened to her concerns, would check around the house and promise to drive-by during the night to watch. He would, she said. She saw his car.

He made her feel safe, she said. And now he was gone. She wanted to tell someone that.

I don’t know the exact conversation Danielle and the woman had. I don’t know her name. I don’t remember if she ended up in a story. I can’t know exactly why she called, but I can guess.

Many people after Bonneau was killed felt something. Few people knew him as a police officer and even fewer knew him as Jim. But many people felt something. I did. And many people did not know what or why.

I suspect she was hurting. She felt this inexplicable loss, a loss that perhaps her family, her neighbors, they wouldn’t understand. She didn’t know Bonneau, but his death hurt. She wanted to tell someone she hurt. She wanted to tell someone why, her story, how she knew him, how much she liked, appreciated and will miss him. She wanted to tell someone that she was not OK with his death.

I think a lot of us wanted to tell someone that.

She wanted someone to listen, someone to understand. She wanted to talk to someone. She picked up her phone and called the newspaper.

Beer selection

Posted by Aaron - 29/01/11 at 11:01:01 pm

“What kind of beer do you want?” Aaron asked.

They walked into the beer cooler at the food store in Petoskey. Marcus slowly spun around, looking at the pallets of beer arranged in cardboard boxes. It was unimpressive.

“Well,” Marcus said, still turning, “That’s always a lengthy process.”

“It doesn’t have to be,” Aaron protested.

They — the five of them, Aaron, Katie, Marcus, Gina and Dylan — had already spent too much time inside the food store looking for a lunch and dinner to make inside a hotel room with only a coffee pot to heat water, a microwave and mini refrigerator.

Sandwiches for lunch, roast beef, pretzels, salad with Caesar dressing, they decided. Gina and Dylan already had mustard, no need to buy that. Dinner, quesadillas, made in the hotel microwave, another decision was made. With chicken, a rotisserie chicken, someone suggested.  Aaron added a bag of rice cookable in the bag in the microwave. Gina and Dylan grabbed a zucchini, a squash and a red pepper, also a jar of salsa. Tortillas and cheese later, and dinner was in the cart.

Do we have enough plates? No, Gina and Dylan said. They actually did. We should have raided the continental breakfast for plates and plastic silverware, Aaron said. They got plates.

“And booze?” Aaron asked. Wine for dinner, a white, beer for later, they decided.

Back inside the beer cooler, “It doesn’t have to be,” Aaron said.

“But I don’t like hops,” Marcus said, standing near a corner where six-packs cost $10.

“OK, I want something cheap.”

“Do you like Killians of LaBatt?” Marcus was moving closer to where Aaron stood, reasonable beer.

“I love LaBatt,” Aaron bent toward the cases of LaBatt. “Cans or bottles? Should we get this 15-pack?”

He reached for the big cardboard box before he even asked and did not listen to the response. Decision made.

They walked out of the cooler and stood looking at the wine.

What’s your favorite color?

Posted by Aaron - 22/01/11 at 06:01:45 am

“What’s your favorite color?” Nick asked.

Aaron started, “I was talking to my mom the other night, complaining about Jackson.”

“I don’t get you guys and complaining about Jackson,” Nick interrupted. “Unless you grew up in some great city, what is wrong…”

It was Aaron’s turn to interrupt. “I’ve narrowed my complaints to two,” he said. “There is no 24-hour coffee shop and no home delivery of the New York Times.”

“That’s simple,” Nick shot back. “Buy a coffee pot and go out and buy your papers.”

Aaron started to protest the response as the two walked into the food store. Flour, milk and something else, they needed.

“What’s your favorite color?” Nick asked again as they stood in line at the checkout.

Aaron scanned the store to see if a color caught his eye. Nothing.

“Definitely not blue,” he said. “I’m sick of blue. Perhaps that color.”

He pointed to a shade of brown or green, he couldn’t be sure, on a sign in the store.

“Band aids,” Nick said. “Where are the band aids.”

He had forgotten band-aids.

“I know where they are,” Nick said.

He left Aaron to stand in line with the basket and went in search of band-aids. One man in front of Aaron had three bags of oranges and two cases of Mountain Dew in his cart. Nothing else. Aaron wondered. He looked at his own cart. Flour. Milk. Granola. His eyes glanced over the headlines of the checkout aisle magazines. Breakups. Celebs getting fat. Lesbians.

Nick returned just as Aaron walked up to one of the checkout stations. He handed the basket to Nick who started scanning the items.

“I was hoping we’d get this one,” Aaron said, grabbing a magazine from the rack. “I wanted to know how he broke her heart.”

A photo of Taylor Swift was one the cover in the lower right corner. Above the photo, the headline, “How he broke her heart.” Aaron’s dad hates Taylor Swift. He saw her once on television and just said, “She’s terrible,” before changing the channel. George H.W. Bush, the older one, Bush I, doesn’t mind Taylor Swift. In an interview with Esquire he called her “an unspoiled girl.”

In that same issue of Esquire, director Aaron Sorkin said you are allowed on “fuck” in a PG-13 movie. Unfair, he claimed. “Not all fucks are the same.”

Nick had trouble scanning in the items. He cursed. A lady came to help. She entered codes on a touch screen with robotic enthusiasm. Nick’s card wouldn’t swipe. He cursed. A lady came to help. She entered codes on a touch screen with robotic enthusiasm. By the exit door, a teenage male employee of the store was talking to a teenage female employee. She had long hair, dark blonde, in a ponytail that sat calmly on the back of her blue uniform face. She had a cold but refreshing. He liked her.

Aaron and Nick left the store. Aaron doesn’t know Nick’s favorite color. He’s never asked.

Round and round on ice

Posted by Aaron - 03/01/11 at 04:01:55 am

Forty seconds may not be enough ice kart racing action. Or it may be plenty.

Read the story here.

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