'GOD KNOWS WHAT TOMORROW WILL BRING'

Thirty seconds earlier, and I would have witnessed a shooting. I had gone
out to get some lunch, and a friend and I were driving down 17th Street SE.
A small crowd was gathering at 17th and C streets, and I craned my neck out
the window to see what was up.

What I saw was a man lying on the sidewalk. My friend, who was driving, said
he had heard someone yell that someone had been shot. I asked him to turn
around and go back, so we circled the block and drove toward the gathering
crowd.

Two police cars were approaching the scene. As I looked out the window, I
caught the eye of one of the officers, and I shook my head in sorrow. A
small, understanding smile caught his lips.

I then turned my attention back to the fallen man. A young woman was
hovering over him, applying pressure to his chest. The injured man tried to
lift his head, and I thanked God he still was alive.

As the ambulance approached and onlookers continued to gather, we drove on
to my house. My stomach was in knots. I felt just as I had two months
earlier when I learned that two teenagers had been shot right across the
street from my house. My feelings ranged from despair, to anger, to
hopelessness.

You see, I live in a drug zone. I live in a murder zone. I live 15 blocks
from the Capitol.

I am a black, 44-year-old single mother of an 11-year-old child. I bought my
first home four years ago. My block has a lot of retired folks, a few white
folks, some renters and plenty of children. I don't regret buying my little
dollhouse. It was a good investment. But often, especially lately, I wish
that I lived somewhere else. It's particularly hard in the summer, when the
streets are filled with children, and my child wants to go outside to play.

But what would I do if I heard gunshots and my only child was outside? These
thoughts have been constant with me lately. Several of my neighbors tell me
not to let anyone run me away, not to give up my house, which is so
convenient to my child's school and within walking distance of my job.

My neighborhood, like most others in the District, is plagued with problems:
drug addicts, murderers, the unemployed, robbers, alcoholics, high school
dropouts. Every corner has a beer-and-wine store.

But after this latest violence, it will be a little quieter, a little softer
because someone has been shot, maybe even killed. The police will be
everywhere. People will discuss the incident and shake their heads. Some
will say that we're living in the last days and times and that Jesus is on
his way. Just the other night, my child asked me if I thought the world
would be around long enough for him to grow up. This atmosphere will last
for a month or two, maybe less, and then it will be back to business as
usual: drugs, drinking, guns, killing.

Why do I even bother to write to The Post? This isn't Columbine or Kosovo --
just one more black male statistic. I guess that I am wishing that Michael
or Oprah or Cosby might read this and invest some of their millions in our
inner city -- maybe build factories and industries to put troubled, angry
youth to work, creating and
producing clothes and shoes -- the material things that they find so
important that some have killed for them. Far-fetched? Lesser ideas have
become reality.

Chances are no one will be shot at or killed in my neck of the woods this
night. But only God knows what tomorrow will bring. I hope it is peace.

Pamela A. Hairston