Virginia Beach has what is possibly the greatest collection of ugly public art I have yet come across. Here are some pictures to prove my point. In addition to these pictures we saw the following scenes that I did not photography while wondering around.
There is a bike path and a pedestrian path along the beach. A young black guy was riding helter-skelter down the pedestrian path and hit a young Hispanic kid. Mayhem ensued, with all the racial overtones you can imagine. Eventually a blond white lady policeman sorted them out. Not sure how, but surely she fined the black cyclist for blatant disregard of common public safety. The Hispanic kid was bruised, and once his father calmed down, walked away.
In Starbucks we got coffee–very slowly–from two very fat gay guys, who spent more time dancing and flirting with each other than making my coffee. All the while a large, black homeless guy wondered distractedly up and down the store and both gay guys ignored him. Finally he took a discarded cup from the garbage and presented it to the blond gal who filled it for him and he left smiling.
Meanwhile, my granddaughter, who is fluent in French, attended a birthday party at one of the five miniature golf courses in town. The event was hosted by one of the French families of the NATO contingent in Newport whose kids attend the French school she and they go to.
And my daughter-in-law told me of her California friend who has just left her husband of seven years and two kids because she has decided she had better admit her seven-year affair with her husband’s best friend with whom she is, as she says, in love.
Nothing seemed real. Or maybe this is the reality of the USA!
Here then the pictures. The one at the top of this posting in of the memorial to the Marines who died. It is the least bad of the worst.
