Belltown Messenger

I'm only able to write this now because Diane Larson, the veteran UPS driver who services a stretch of Belltown, fended off two would-be shoulder-bag robbers until they fled. Otherwise, I'd be without the computer on which I write this.

That happened around 12:45 p.m. on Wednesday, Dec. 22. Later, in the Two Bells (where I told Diane I would be after I thanked her for her help), I told a uniformed cop (with a plainchothes detective standing behind him) what had happened:

I'd just been to the bank, and was walking north on Fourth Avenue toward the Two Bells for lunch. I was thinking this solstice day was the first day of the rest of my life that from this day on, I vowed, I'd have no financial worries, no career worries, no stress. I would have to say goodbye to my old existence of being waylaid by constant panic.

Then, out of my peripheral vision, a stringy-haired, unshaven white guy lunged toward me, cornered me against a wall near the Chinese Wok restaurant, and grabbed at my shoulder bag (containing, among many other things, this laptop). I held onto the bag for dear life (no pipsqueak punk does THAT to ME!) and yelled "NOOOO!" repeatedly.

A stocky black guy from across the street ran toward me and the crook, yelling "I got it. I can handle it." Instead of helping me fend off the crook, he lunged for the bag himself. (He might or might not have been a mate of crook #1.)

I held onto it like it was part of me (the computer is, of course, my most intimate tool and even an extension of my mind). A half dozen Chinese Wok patrons came out to yell at the crooks but did nothing more. Then Diane came, stomped her foot on the fallen bag to keep it in place, and held both crooks at bay until they chose to run off.

That, my friend, is what Brown can do for me.

I learned: For a self-styled lifelong passive weakling/wuss, when I have to I can be as feisty and ornery as my Snohomish County bad-boy upbringing has reared me to be. I'm also good at making a spectacle of myself; my stubborn "NOOO," one of many frustration catch phrases which have often cused others to dismiss me as a weirdo and a freak, effectively helped save my ass. I'm a fighter. I'm a survivor. I triumph against all odds. I'm a "real man," damn it.

While I couldn't give a good enough description of the crooks for the cops (who told me "tunnel vision" often occurs in people at moments of sudden panic), I still remember the steely, desperate, focused evil look of the first would-be thief, and how he instantly turned into a running coward when he knew he'd lost.

Some guy in The Nation a few years back wrote about having been mugged in New Haven, CT. He said that, far from turning his back on urban society and wanting to cocoon in the burbs, he was grateful his crime took place in a city, where passersby were immediately there to help him and where emergency-room care was only minutes away.

I feel likewise today. If I'd been mugged in Woodinville (and, yes, it happens), I'd have been stuck one-to-two against the muggers with no one to hear me for miles. Heck, if it'd happened in one of the nether regions of West Seattle where I sometimes find myself wandering off of buses, I'd have been TSOL.

I also can't stop thinking of the thieves, not as the opposite-race subhumans the conservatives would claim to protect me from, but as right- wingers without resources. These dorks wanted to take my stuff for no good reason, offering nothing in return, just because they believed they had the power to do so. Sounds just like BushCo to me...

A Visit with Diane Larson

Diane Larson has served Belltown as a United Parcel Service driver since 1982. She's spent her entire UPS career in Belltown, though her route boundaries have steadily gotten busier and shorter. She originally serviced the store formerly known as The Bon Marche (an original cofounder of UPS as a cooperative delivery service).

These days, "I start at the 2000 block of Fourth, run up to Denny, then around and down Third to the 2600 block. That's enough for one truckload.... This time of year I'm usually out from 8 in morning until 5 o'clock. At Christmas time I could be out until 8 at night."

Her biggest stops? "I spend a good three hours most days at the Fourth and Blanchard Building. Today the Warwick Hotel got 30 boxes, because they've got a trade show going. Sub Pop gets a lot."

Her origin: "I was a journalism major at Seattle U. I went and moved to France for a while. When I came back I needed a job. I got hired on at UPS as Christmas help. They hired me back the next January and I've been there ever since.

"I really like my job. I like dealing with the people. You get out; you're your own boss on your route; your day zooms by." "Women have always been a low percentage of UPS drivers and they still are; under 10 percent, I'm sure. I work with a really great group of guys for the most part. The city core is really lucky to have the really great group of drivers it has. There are five or six of us just in Belltown."

Her strangest shipment: "There used to be a pet store downtown. One day I had a delivery there; it smelled so bad. It turned out to be a box of turtles. I've been getting tropical fish too; I feel so bad for them, the way they're jostled around so much."

Over the years she's seen a lot of activities she'd rather not have seen, on the streets and alleys she travels, in the homes and offices she visits. "I've seen everything, much more than I've wanted to. You see it all out there." "Lately crime has been terrible in Belltown. I haven't seen it this bad with people on the street; I don't know what's going on."

Belltown's changes have affected her work over the years, particularly "all the apartments and condos. That's half my day now." Also, the rise of online retail "has definitely affected my volume; all these people in these apartments in Belltown obviously have the money and they know how to order." Computers have affected her work in another way, thanks to the UPS.com tracking page. "Everybody has a computer now. Everybody knows where their stuff is. They know before I do that their stuff is in the truck." How long will Larson keep driving? "Another five years if my body holds out. so far so good, no major aches and pains." -CH