The Media of the Bumper

My mother has a lot of bumper stickers. She always really has. They have always been embarassing to me and have caused me fear that some crazy who didn't agree with them would come yelling at me. This has happened on occation but I have also gotten amazingly positive feedback about them.

When I was little, I thought they were cool. On her VW Rabbit, the crooked "Celebrate Diversity!" that I put on at age 9, I felt, added to it's hoopty-ness. As I became a pre-teen, I began to be embarrassed by her car, by the stickers, by its state in general. When she finally got a new car the summer before I entered high school, I basked in the fact that it had a clean bumper: it was a normal car. Then, after September 11th, in a reaction to all the American flags, she explained to me, she stickered the bumper once again. She had bought a sticker with a John Lenon quote about imagining all the people living in peace. Along with many political ones there is a Norwegian sticker with smiling bee that says, "Pure Honey!" in Norwegian. A friend gave her one that stated simply, "Free Palestine." This one has weathered the years. The John Lenon one has not.

A week ago, while I was home in Berkeley, a guy in a UC Berkeley tee-shirt walked up to me as I was at the gas station, filling the tank, my hips self-confidently jutted against the pump. I noted that he wore a thick star of David. He spoke to me.

"Who put that "Free Palestine" sticker on your car?" he demanded.

"My mother," I said, but he didn't seem to hear that.

"Do you know what it means?" He was refering to the statement, "free Palestine." He was insenced.

"Yes."

"I'm a JEW." He pointed to his chest.

"I'm a Christian," I told him.

To drive his point his point home, he informed me, with fire and brimstone thickly folded into his words, "You support terrorists!"

And with that, he turned his back.

"So do you," I told his back, willing to argue that he would probably agree with me that the CIA-funded Fatah President's Guard was most certainly a terrorist entity. But afore-said dude did not want to stay. What struck me the most about this guy as that everything he said except for his last statement meant something different than the meaning of the words themselves.

This was one of the more comical experience I have had with Zionists accosting me about my that particular one of my mother's bumper stickers.

I have often had discussions with my mother about her choice of media. She wants to get a message out and show that she is not afraid. I am afraid. I do not want to get into an altercation at the gas pump. I have been car-stalked at night by a woman who wanted to talk to me about the Pogroms. It's not my car! However, I've also gotten encouragement. Once a guy saw the stickers and asked me for my number or email. I refused. I do not meet people over my mother's car. Others have admired my courage for posting them. That was the day that another person had stuck a note, "Free my dick and balls," in the rear windshield wipers. Again, it's not my car. My mother and I have made friends with fellow hikers over them.

I do not know how many people my mother's bumper stickers effected. There is no way to know. Which means that the conversation will never be over.