Sticks and Stones

May break my bones, but words will never hurt me . . . we may have thought that was a true saying when we were kids, but as an adult, we know that words are quite hurtful. As a matter of fact, the damaging effects of words could hurt us much longer than any visible wounds. With that being said, I don’t have any plans of discontinuing my blog because of the claim that family members are being hurt by the things I say because that’s not my problem. Like I stated on my facebook page yesterday, if the things you are doing are hurtful and/or embarrassing to your friends, family, etc. then you might want to stop doing what you’re doing.
The day I posted the link to the story about Officer Darren Dennis Hobson, I decided that I would share the link on my facebook page, instead of blogging about it. I had discovered the information about Hobson days before I posted the link. When I received the packet with information about Hobson, I didn’t know what to do with it; there were several things going through my mind—and most of what I thought would happen did happen. I thought that the first thing Hobson would do would be to try and retaliate against me, and true to form, that’s exactly what he did. I have several family members that worked and retired from the New York Police Department and I am well aware of the Blue Code of Silence (or Blue Wall of Silence)— an unwritten rule among police officers not to report on another colleague's errors, misconducts or crimes. Even in a small municipality like Lumberton, I thought about this code being enforced and the idea that Hobson would recruit some of his colleagues to assist in his reign of terror. I know I like to act like Teflon Don, but it was quite unsettling to have a white, Neo-Nazi looking officer threaten you and it’s even more unsettling that we have a board, comprised mostly of African-Americans, that didn’t think this matter needed to be addressed. When Hobson confronted me, I was sitting in a parked car, a police car pulls up next to me, and according to his Meridian arrest photo, he’s over six feet tall, and while he’s standing over me, I have the story about his arrest for domestic violence displayed on the screen of my laptop; then as he get ready to return to his patrol car, he’s standing there tapping his gun. I can not claim to know the mindset of this individual, but I perceived his actions as a threat and I really feel that he should be charged with simple assault. Now, I thought nothing could top what happened, and then I found out that he has an interesting relationship with our city clerk, Stephanie Mullings. So the pieces began to fall into place—Hobson was more than willing to step outside the bounds of his duties as a law enforcement officer because there’s the possibility that Stephanie is stroking his night stick.
I truly thought Stephanie and I had settled our differences but she’s the type that like to throw her rocks and hide her hands. I don’t have a spy in the office, I have concerned citizens, (most of whom are of the Caucasian persuasion) giving me details about your “private” conversations. So, how do you think I know about the missing money from the concession stands, how did I know about the racist comments you made about Melissa, how did I know about the city workers that came into the office when you and Sue were bragging about how you two were going to give our newly elected mayor hell but at the voting precinct, you were telling Mayor Elect Holder that you voted for her, how did I know about you going over post after post on my blog with someone over the phone and how did I know about Rebecca working as city clerk; one of the people she collected money from, called me and told me that Rebecca Hale was at city hall and Stephanie was no where to be found. And how in the Hale did I find out about Bobby Gibson attempting to use his business relationship with Ben Winston to have me banned from the library . . . there are people all around you that want you exposed and you can’t see the forest for the trees.