A couple of months ago a couple of people I’ll call Barz and Hoon used black spray paint on signs, support columns, and under the overpass at Maple and M-14. I call them Barz and Hoon because, in addition to squiggles and drips, they spray painted their names. Instantly irritated, I had thoughts of an act of violence. I wanted to slap them upside the head. Not by any stretch of the imagination is this graffiti artistic, pleasant, or functional. In fact, it gets in the way of actually reading what the signs say. Which can still be a problem at the traffic round-abouts.
Several weeks after Fonik came along with a white can of spray paint, tried to cross out Barz and Hoon, added his/her name, along with profanity to the wall. Call me old fashioned, but profanity really bugs me.
Last week the play set at Garden Homes Park a block from my house was covered “with inappropriate words and pictures”. And on my morning walk (my route is directly by all of these places) I discovered graffiti on my sidewalk. Norm is my graffiti artist and on the urging of the Neighborhood watch coordinator’s email today, I called to report the incident.
The Ann Arbor officer was pleasant, took photos, and promised to report the incident to the investigating detective. Although I’m happy to have such a responsive police force, it’s so clear to me that we all have better things to do. “Except”, as the officer said, “the teenagers who have spray paint.” [sigh]