No facts, no numbers, no stats. Just a purely subjective qualitative observation…

I had to break quarantine today to go to the vet’s. The catly beast was due for a critical blood test (she’s not been well lately) and I felt I could take her down safely if I took my precautions (mask, hand sanitizer, etc).

I drove west to University Avenue, turned south to Oakland Park Boulevard where I noticed an enormous line of cars in the northbound right lane of University stopped to make a right turn east onto Oakland Park. A police officer was directing traffic. I continued south, crossing Oakland Park, and the line of cars was stacked up bumper to bumper for about a mile. I realized the cars were lined up for a food giveaway station somewhere on the Boulevard.

Eventually I got to the vet’s, about a mile down the road, where a cop paused the long line so I could turn left into the parking lot. The line of cars continued on to the south for as far as I could see, and the flashing blue lights told me the cops were checked out on this and had a plan in place to handle the traffic.

It took only a few minutes at the doc’s to finish my business, so I turned north out of the parking lot, assisted by the cop who stopped traffic in the northbound right lane so I could get into the center lane and head north myself.

When I got to Oakland Park, I decided to go home by the back route so I could see how far the line of cars went down the Boulevard. The cops had set up a right turn lane for cars not waiting in line and I turned east on Oakland Park, driving down the center lane parallel to the line of waiting cars. About a mile down the road,
the line was slowly creeping into a big parking lot where the food relief station was set up. Cops where everywhere. At the eastern end of the lot, they were letting those cars who had picked up groceries back onto Oakland Park.

At least two miles of cars, bumper-to-bumper, plus all those waiting south of the vet’s office that I couldn’t see. And these were not Grapes of Wrath Okie junkers, either, these were clean, well-maintained, family vehicles, SUVs, sedans, suburban cruisers, many of them apparently late models. I couldn’t see the people inside, in the heat, A/Cs were on and tinted windows were up. But I instantly realized these were not people looking for a free lunch. No one in that line, in that heat, would have been there wasting gas unless they absolutely had to.

Of course, gas is cheap now, less than two bucks a gallon. And it occurs to me, my cat is financially better off than any of those people in those cars…