Last night I set my watch alarm for 6:30 AM thinking if I don't feel like getting up when it goes off I can just go back to sleep and watch it on TV at 8:00. Turns out there was no need for that decision, or for the alarm either. I woke up at 4:00 AM with the situation simmering in my brain and could not go back to my slumber. I headed for the Keystone Towers soon to be Keystone Rubble at 6:30 AM.
The Keystone Towers was built in 1973, the same year I barely graduated high school. The 15 story tower was apartments and the 4 story tower was office space, both constructed without the foresight of air conditioning.
It ended up being government subsidized (we pay for it) housing. So you guessed it, the place went to hell. For the last several years the buildings were empty except for crack heads, drug dealers and squatters becoming a major eyesore and criminal cesspool in that section of Indy.
I got to the area just a couple minutes after 7:00 and the police had just blocked off the streets close to the impending explosions. Right when I got close to where I wanted to park I discovered I had left my wallet at home, what was more disconcerting was the fact that I had not forgotten to bring my concealed weapon.
So here I am with the police all around and one of their brothers just the night before had been shot, (he’s going to be ok thankfully) and I don't have my drivers license or my handgun permit with me, shit!
I decide to leave the gun in the car and walk to the best vantage point I could find which ended up being the intersection of Keystone and Binford. I had a nice guardrail sit on and a good view of the south side of the buildings. As I sat there I observed car after car being driven by idiots who couldn't follow the simplest directions being given by IMPD's finest. The dumbasses trying to go around the blockades, people on foot trying to walk into the danger zone, Lance Armstrong wannabes thinking since they were on a bike it was ok to ride on the closed streets. Listening to the cops yelling at these turds I thought I won't be the only one here who hopes this blast relieves some pent up anger.
As people gathered at my corner I noticed a guy who seemed to be setting up a serious video system, he turned out to be a cameraman for a local ABC affiliate. Seems he had set up 2 hours ago in a great location only to be booted out 1 hour before go time and now he along with his blast pass was here with the rest of us shmucks trying to keep the late comers from standing in front of his shot that probably wouldn't make air anyway.
As time grew closer to our combined anger management therapy more and more latecomers who didn't wake up at 4:00 AM kept crowding in front of our established vistas and there was much consternation in the crowd. Then this jackass stands right in front of me, even the sound of the fake shutter click of my I Phone when I snapped this pic right behind his head didn't faze him.
I am close to asking this freak very nicely to get the f@"$ out of the way when I see right behind me the answer to all of my problems, well this problem anyway. Right behind me in a tiny wooded area was an 18-inch long log.
I'm am towering over the whole damn lot now, sweet and no, I was not in danger of falling over backwards Rita.
I'm standing there on my perch watching the crowd which had become a spectacle in itself. The last to show up seemed like they might have been the last occupiers of the soon to be ruins. Maybe they came here to give homage to their former cocaine Shangri-La. No doubt stumbling down memory lane remembering their first rock they fired up in the abandoned building or some really nice crack ho they met there, or the lucky day they found a somewhat clean syringe next to a dead rat. Ahhh, the nostalgia was palpable.
One minute to go the final warning blast wakes up the rest of that part of the city; I divert my attention from the crowd of mixed nuts and look to the center of my therapy. The pictures and video I took really don't do my vantage point justice; I really had a good look at the event.
I do an internal countdown from 60 seconds trying to allow for the speed of sound. Then the first of a series of one second volleys hits, after several of those I could see the top of the main tower start to fold in on itself like an accordion. It took some time for that sound to reach my ears and when it did I tried my best to put my latest problem at the bottom floor of Keystone Towers.
Finally both buildings lay in a heap of twisted concrete, steel and crack pipes. A huge cloud of dust rose up and drifted south. I'm not sure if the cop or the cameramans frustration level had diminished by watching this building laid to waste, but I felt some level of satisfaction.
It wasn't the sweet release I had hoped for, but it will have to do for now.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmGpNuJlaXY
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