Charles Mudede in The StrangerWhat amazed me about the dead rat was its location—right next to the huge Darigold milk plant. Made of the stuff of Speedy Gonzales, the rat was clearly thinking big. Instead of invading ordinary homes across the street, it was going to the source, the plant with its vats of cow’s milk. If the rat had made it inside—I think the attempt was made at night (I came across the rat around 9:00 a.m.)—it would have spent the evening drinking and swimming in heaven.
It happened right next to a mural that celebrates the diversity of Columbia City. The mural has everybody in it: a mariachi band, a jazz trumpeter, a deranged Arab, a white man holding a raccoon, a blond woman holding flowers, a melancholy East Indian woman, a Filipino woman who is laughing wickedly, a dragon, and, above this confusion of races, Chief Seattle trying his best to embrace it all with open arms. When the white man came to the land of his ancestors, the chief had no idea he was bringing with him the whole fucking world.
