Last night was National Night Out -American's Night Out Against Crime. I'm sorry to say I missed it. I was too busy holding down the fort. See, unlike everyone else we are not secured. Secured, meaning we do not have fencing all the way around every square inch of our property. Therefore, I was concerned about leaving my place for a "Night Out".

I live in fence land. Everybody has some sort of fencing around their property. Unlike some neighborhoods lawn care is not a top priority but people do spend alot on fencing. Some use animals for a more rural solution with pit bulls and roosters guarding the premises and others resort to full on tactical warfare fencing.

That's what I want, warfare fencing. I want to bunker down and never have to leave. We built a fence around the back yard. It was no easy feat. First, we put up a 10 foot chain link fence, mounted in a cement wall. We wanted to grow something on the chain link fence and decided that from a protection stand point, beaugonvilla was a good idea. The trouble is that growing anything around here is almost impossible. There are thousands of grade school kids who pass by here on a daily basis who accompanied by their mothers think its cool to yank out anything that looks like it might sprout in the next 10 years.

As a result we had to cover the chain link fence with surplus army tarp just so we could get the beugonvilla to grow. We were blasting the vines with Miracle Grow in the hopes that it would speed up the process. The tarp was experiencing graphetti taggers almost daily. A few kids smeared nachos into it and another budding Einstein set it on fire. Just when they were about to completely rip the whole thing down we unveiled our mondo vines with their 3 inch thorns. I hate to say it but it felt so good to listen for the first couple of expletives.

All of our neighbors have completely fenced themselves in. One guy has barbed wire in his backyard. Another guy has broken glass embedded into a concrete wall. They also are heavily armed and have attack dogs. There isn't alot of interaction between neighbors so all this defense seems to be normal.

The people across the street have backyards that lead into an alley. They get to experience discarded mattresses, couches and La-Z-Boy recliners and the condoms that go along with them as they go to put their car in their garage. One guy came home one night and found a woman pinned up against his garage. It seems that whomever had rammed their vehicle into her and left her there had had the gall to remember the car stereo before they left.

There are hundreds of tenement low income apartments on the other side of the alley. The folks in those buildings are not too concerned with their surroundings. Often some of the occupants will not bother to take their garbage down from the fifth floor and instead just open a window and throw it down the side of the building. Thus a slope of garbage is being created weekly with no end in site. Locally this is known as the "stench pyramid."

One guy who helped us out one day when we found a crack addict in our house trying to steal a radio, has a 20 foot sheet metal fence which has been chainsawed through so many times that it looks like a metal quilt.

We're going to attempt to put up another 10 foot fence around the front of the house. Evidently there's a city ordinance that states that if you live on a corner you can only have a 5 foot fence. To which I reply, "hey, you live on this corner, Mr. Mayor" and then we'll talk about the height requirements.

I have envisioned pit bulls on each corner with uzi's pointed out towards the street. You may think this is extreme but I left out the overhead electrical barbed wire, the surveillance cameras and artillery shells pointed at the front gate.

For those of you with modest wooden, chain link or God help you "picket" fences I hope you appreciate your ability to leave the gate unlocked. In an urban warfare zone the art of fencing has become locks, chains and both barrels pointed at whomever dares to enter this "gated" community.

Diana Stoneberg writes "Biographical Biopsies". Her piece The Will To Live appeared in September, 1996 Grrowl!, and My Neighbor the Nazi and Jewish Like Me appeared in December, 1996 Grrowl! .