I Caught Someone Defacing My Tesla. I Couldn't Believe What Happened After I Confronted Them.
'I think that kid just scratched your car!' my physical therapist said, looking out of his large office window that faced the parking lot. He hurried out the door as I stood against the wall, mid-exercise, with a deflated ball behind my knee.
Huh?
I quickly followed him outside, where we found a kid, probably about 16 or 17, standing slump-shouldered after being caught. They had a look that seems to be especially popular among many teens these days: short cropped hair, chipped black polish on nibbled nails, handcuff earrings, an oversize, faded Pussy Riot T-shirt and oversize pants.
'Did you scratch my car?' I demanded.
'I didn't scratch it!' they said.
'What did you do to my car?' I pressed.
'I didn't scratch it. I just put a sticker on it,' they replied sheepishly.
We moved to the back of my Tesla, where a 'Swasticar' sticker now adorned its bumper.
'I'm sorry. I'll take it off,' they said, kneeling down.
'You know, I bought this car thinking I was doing the right thing,' I said as they picked away at the surprisingly tenacious sticker. 'I didn't know things were going to turn out this way.'
When I bought my Tesla several years ago, I had just moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico, from New York, where I hadn't owned a car for 20 years. I had moved to a place where drought, fire mitigation, and water restrictions are common topics of conversation — only a few months after I bought my car, nearly a million acres burned in one of the largest forest fires in the state — so buying a Tesla felt like making an environmentally responsible purchase. I had no idea Elon Musk would become the man he is today or do the things he has done — and is doing. If I had to buy a car today, I'd certainly make a different choice.
'I'm really sorry,' they said.
People walking through the parking lot eyed the situation playing out behind my car: a kid earnestly trying to remove a sticker while I loomed over them with my arms crossed. Both of us felt awkward in the silence.
What do I do now? I wondered. Yell at them? Threaten to call their parents — or the cops?
I took a breath and relaxed my stance.
'I get that you're frustrated. I'm frustrated too,' I told them.
They looked up, a bit surprised that I was offering a moment of understanding rather than further shaming them.
'I am. I'm really angry,' they said.
'What's going on?' I softly asked.
I wish I could say my equanimity was due to my years of Buddhist practice or my work as a spiritual director, helping people from different faith traditions on their spiritual journeys. Both require being comfortable with silence and gentle curiosity, and sure, that may have helped. But if I'm being honest, that's way too rose-colored.
I know how feeling hurt and panicked can make us do things we might not normally do. Only a couple of weeks earlier, I had done something hurtful. After I found a large, unauthorized charge on my credit card, I had an enormous and embarrassing overreaction while on a phone call with a customer service representative. I wasn't personally insulting — I acknowledged that I knew the charge wasn't his fault — but I was, let's say, loud.
At one point I heard myself yelling, 'IF I DON'T GET MY MONEY BACK IMMEDIATELY, I'M GOING TO LOSE MY MIND!' I was so angry that I almost didn't hear him say the funds would be returned within a day. All the while, I was aware of a saner part of myself witnessing this colossal meltdown, and she was just shaking her head and saying, 'Oh, girrrrrrl. You're being ridiculous.' And I was, of course.
Afterward, when I had calmed down, I wondered how I had reached a DEFCON 1 level of anger so quickly and acted so poorly. Yes, I felt powerless at the hands of a negligent corporation, but it was more than that. Like many of us today, I feel helpless, especially as the policies of our current administration are beginning to affect me and my community. My immigrant friends worry that they will have problems returning to their home here if they dare visit family abroad. Other friends are concerned for the health and safety of their trans children. I worry that my family's suffering in Cuba will only get worse. That my 91-year-old mother's Social Security and Medicare benefits will be cut. That my partner's kids will never be able to buy a home. That I'll never be able to retire. And so many others are facing so many other unthinkable challenges.
However, the more I thought about it, the more I realized the sad truth behind my outburst: My feelings of powerlessness were really rooted in the Stage 4 cancer diagnosis my partner had recently received. That customer service representative had no idea (and, honestly, neither did I) how deeply I was mourning the news that my time with this beautiful man — whom I had only started building a life with and whom I had waited so long for — may very well be cut short.
I have suddenly felt a complete lack of control, and I long for some way to have agency. But I don't, at least in respect to his diagnosis, and I hate it. I wondered if this teenager shares a similar feeling of powerlessness too. After all, they're coming of age at a time when, instead of seeing a bright, shiny future ahead of them, they are faced with a world that is in many respects falling apart. I can totally see how feeling like that might cause a kid to sticker cars they feel represent that doom.
Until my partner's diagnosis, I had taken great comfort in the feeling of being connected to something greater than myself — call it Spirit, the Universe, Nature, God — whose laws and workings are ultimately a kind of mystery that is way beyond the limits of my understanding.
I sometimes wish I believed in a personal god just so I could curse its cruelty, but my beliefs don't run that way. I can't fathom divine justice nor injustice in all this suffering. I only know there is Connection. So when I found myself standing in that parking lot listening to that young person who had just vandalized my car tell me their fears, my eyes welled up in recognition. We're both angry and frustrated and feeling powerless, and we're both craving empathy.
'Can I give you a hug?' they asked, tears in their eyes too.
I said yes and I felt our bodies relaxing as we embraced.
When they finally finished removing the sticker and left, I got into my car and sat quietly doing nothing for a moment.
My heart genuinely went out to that kid. I obviously don't condone what they did, but I understand the anger that led them to do it.
During our conversation, we talked about our frustrations, about how to work for change more effectively, about the need for more compassion and community. I was in awe of how present and thoughtful they were, and I also could see how much they were struggling to do right too.
This incident, which started out so terribly, turned into the highlight of my day. Still, I'm aware that our encounter wasn't as challenging — or even potentially dangerous — as it could have been. That teen probably shares 95% of my beliefs, seemed to be acting out in a mostly harmless way, and was open to connecting with me. But what if I had come upon an adult who held radically different views from me or who lashed out when they were confronted? Would I have been able to take a breath and try to be curious about their story or their fears — not with the goal to change their mind or change mine, but simply to learn what they might be carrying? Because we all are carrying something these days.
Going forward, it's my hope that instead of waiting for moments of conflict to pop up, I can be more open to simply meeting people (within or outside my blue bubble), asking them more questions, and making fewer assumptions about who they are, what they're feeling or what they're going through. I don't know if I'll always be able to rise to that aspiration, but after feeling what I felt when I drove away from that parking lot on that sun-bright morning, every part of me wants to try.
Katarina Wong is an artist, writer, and spiritual director based in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where she lives with her partner and their blended dog family. Katarina is the author of Three Threads, a weekly Substack newsletter that uses art to explore personal creativity and spirituality as core to the human experience. You can find her on Instagram @katarinawong and on Bluesky @katarinawong.
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