The White Vans
PART 1
I worked as an elementary school teacher for over 30 years. At some point, during many different school years, our school district sent an advisory letter home to parents. These parental advisories were always somewhat alarming. They usually said something along these lines:
“This morning, before the start of school, an attempted kidnapping of one of our third graders (or other grade) took place near (insert school name). Thankfully, the young student managed to escape the clutches of the would-be kidnapper. The suspect in this incident, described as a white or Latin male in his mid-30s, apparently attempted to pull the child into his vehicle, a white or beige van with blacked-out windows. Parents are advised to stay on high alert and report anything suspicious to the police. It is our policy to ensure the safety of our students on their way to school and on their way home from school. Thank you for your support.”
The local newspaper (remember newspapers?) wrote about these frightening incidents, and they sometimes got reported on during the area’s television news programs. Despite it all, I do not recall a single occasion where a suspect driving a white or beige-colored van got arrested for the attempted kidnapping of an elementary school child before the start of a school day. If I’m not mistaken, there may have been a few times when a child did not show up for school because a parent in a custody battle with a former partner chose to keep their child out of school, but that is not the same as potential kidnappers in nondescript vehicles. Nevertheless, we should always be alert and aware of our surroundings, and teach our children to do the same, along with viable safety and survival strategies.
All this blah-blah-liciousness is a preamble to what happened today out in the part of Modesto where I live.
PART 2
For the sake of my health, I usually ride my bike several times a week. Normally, I ride for about 40 minutes or so, but the other day I rode to the Virginia Corridor near Modesto Junior College. It’s a paved trail designed for walking and bicycling. I put in over 12 miles on that day’s ride. Today, though, I slowly rode around the neighborhood listening to jazz music on my phone as I pedaled along the streets.
A street near my home curves around two traffic circles. Though it’s the same street, its name changes after it passes through its second traffic circle. From the air, it would look like a gigantic “U” shape.
On my ride, I saw two white vans parked one right after the other in a shady area between the two traffic circles. No one sat in the driver’s seat in either of these vehicles. They were older vans, both dented in various places, but their license plates appeared to have current registration tags because they were the same color as the tags on my car, also currently registered. The only windows in both of them were the driver’s window, the passenger’s window, and the two blacked-out windows on the rear end doors. Neither van had any sort of signage, such as “Nancy’s Painting Service” or “Billy’s Bonny Basketry.” I took a mental note and continued riding. When I got near the park, I saw yet another white van, this one a little fancier than the other two because it had a blue stripe and a large window on both of its sides. These large windows had curtains installed for privacy. It seemed to be in much better condition than the other two vans. No one sat in its driver’s seat either.
It took almost 45 minutes to ride five miles today. When I got home, I spent the rest of the day reading news stories, playing my guitar, and watching television.
PART 3
At night here in Modesto, I sometimes hear loud booming noises that sound like gunshots. My daughter says they’re noises from fireworks, but I’m sure some of those noises come from firearms. I went to bed at 1:20 AM sharp. At 2:24 AM, I shot out of bed, awakened by what sounded to me like several rapid-fire gunshots followed by three loud explosions. A few minutes later, I heard multiple sirens from police cars and a couple of fire trucks. I closed our bedroom window because the smell of smoke wafted in.I threw on some clothes and walked toward the park, now lit up by fire and the lights from police cars, two fire engines, and an ambulance. The van near the park I rode by earlier was on fire, the whole thing, not just the engine compartment. A crowd of people from the neighborhood stood around, some in bathrobes and pajamas, all with their phones out recording videos and still shots. Aside from law enforcement and emergency service personnel, no one could get closer than about 150 yards to the fire, since the police cordoned off the street. The only thing the people gathered there knew for certain was that a van was burning. Someone else in the growing crowd told me that two other vans were on fire down by the second traffic circle, and looking in that direction, I saw the orange glow of fire and the flashing blue and red lights of police cars and fire engines. I was too tired to investigate, so I went home and got back in bed.