Cambridge, Maryland sucks you in and never lets go. This is what Twain meant when he said, “Never argue with stupid people, they will drag you down to their level and then beat you with experience.” Only this is an entire town. It’s what I imagine Alabama is, but ostensibly part of the North East. Criminals and the desperate end up draining here like a sewer. I guess the first sign should have been that we could afford to live so close to the water.

There are sex offenders surrounding this house. But the criminality starts at the top here. It’s a ponzi scheme of racism, corruption, lack of education and laziness. The White politicians and “important” families have the same last names as the Black men in the police blotter.

Recently there was a sewage leak near where the Choptank River meets the Chesapeake. The city made a big to-do about fixing the sewers after flooding spat out toilet paper and sewage onto Long Wharf Park, the marina and into people’s basements. The city got a private, non-union contractor who hired foreign workers.  After all their talk about empowering communities, they couldn’t give residents even a decent paying public works job. Then in a shocking development, that sewer system broke and raw sewage leaked into the Choptank River last week.

The zoning commission wants money for anything they can possibly get their grubby mits on, to preserve, as their handbook states “the façade.” And that is what this town is, a façade. You’ll see beautiful houses and some nifty looking store fronts, but they’re just that, fronts. It’s like an old Western movie set where the buildings are plywood painted with “Saloon” and held up by two by fours.

Their Historical District is mainly old row homes and cabins built for oyster shuckers and servants in the 1910’s. But they can squeeze money out of anyone who wants to improve their property, so it’s mainly rundown apartments and recently flipped, grey and black crap. I think the guy who flips them must have gotten a good deal on grey siding because that’s all he uses.

We meant this to be a temporary break from the country. Try out the salty life. Eat crabs. The crabs taste like motor oil and sewage.

And, like I said, I’m surrounded by criminals. I can’t drive, and this place requires crossing a bridge known for its suicides and the terror of having to use it, just to get to Annapolis.

On my block, the criminals and sex offenders run everything. People either stay inside or have to run the gauntlet of the giant skinhead on the Sex Offender registry for life and his pals. I live between five registered sex offenders.

This is around the corner from where the Ironman activities take place. Take my advice, don’t stay here if you’re going to take part in that. Don’t eat here either. Especially the seafood, if a night on the toilet doesn’t seem appealing to you.

This is the South. And that kind of South where the family tree is a pole. The people here think this is an independent fiefdom instead of part of the US, and the laws don’t matter here. An attorney actually said to me “No White man with a private attorney will get found guilty here.” Won’t get arrested either. The cops come out, maybe remember to give you an incident number, and leave it to you to work it out.

And if you protest, get ready. I had cops come out to my house to tell me the city would sue me for harassment if I wrote to my elected officials at their city emails. They called Crisis on me for complaints about being watched by a man who cut a hole in my fence with a powersaw in order to trespass. They called Crisis so many times instead of talking to me that they’re banned from calling Crisis on me anymore.

That giant skinhead, sex offender? He was out calling me every disgusting name and threatening me in front of the police this past weekend, and the cops did nothing. They chatted with him and laughed. About me.

I’m not obviously White, and it shows in how I’m treated by most people and the police. I’m also five feet tall. I’ll never forget, I brought up a pretty obvious drug stash house to the new mayor when I first moved here, and he said to me, “It’s Cambridge, what do you expect?”

Expect nothing from Cambridge but being sucked into the trash.

Unless you truly want to try the muskrat they sell at the fish market. I thought it must be some kind of crab bait at first. These flayed rodents with their eyes and teeth and tails still connected, to prove they aren’t actual rats, are considered a local heritage dish. You aren’t “from here” unless you have a family recipe!

They’ve let snow storms pass without plowing. Then they send zoning around to see if everyone shoveled. They don’t even do the state highway for days. The county owes money to the State for its cooked books, and they pass the shortfall down to you in your taxes. Ours went up almost five hundred dollars in the first four years.

The last mayoral election was between a previous mayor who had been charged with revenge porn against his wife, and another former mayor who makes John Street’s nepotism look quaint. And they make it impossibly difficult to vote for city and county positions. They’re usually in October, for one day, from 7 to 7, and there is one polling station that requires a car to access.

Not all of the Eastern Shore of Maryland is this bad, it’s just Cambridge and Dorchester County. And it’s full of out of towners who bought high thinking they’d make a killing on Airbnbs and short term rentals. They’re losing their shirts.

We are losing money. And I’m losing my mind. You can only be gaslit by the dumbest cops you’ve ever met, crooked politicians and zoning officials who leave incriminating voicemails letting you know they’re screwing with you and laughing because they forgot to hang up the phone for so long. DARVO on steroids.

It’s so dumb. If you’ve got half a brain, half a heart and an unfortunate tendency to demand equality, fairness and the following of the law, you’re the enemy. I reported a business once when I lived in PA for trying to intimidate me into paying a bill that wasn’t mine. Since I’ve moved here, I’ve reported a car dealership, a CRNP, a therapist, the police department, city officials, a real estate agent, the lawyer who told me that White men can’t get convicted, the prosecutor’s office and the electric company. At least I got my $35 back from the electric company after a year and a half.

And, even though my house is for sale, I’m writing this. Because people need to know about this crab-infested piss stop on the way to Ocean City, and to stand well back. The town is so poor, there isn’t a Lowes, Applebee’s, shoe and leather repair etc. Anything that requires people with at least a lower middle class income does not exist here. There’s a Walmart.

And a Hyatt they built to take away most of the water access. You can’t even see the water. It’s a fortress. Then there’s the decades-long riverfront development project that just sits there “under construction.” That whole process is as transparent as molasses. They don’t even have open townhalls. We plebes can watch, watch mind you, via Zoom. Not that anyone votes with the way they run their elections.

Don’t come here. Don’t move here. And if you live here. Get out! Unless you want to fight people who celebrate the Lost Cause of the Confederacy while trying to make a buck off the fact that Harriet Tubman escaped from this Bermuda Triangle hell hole. Maybe the mosquitoes can carry me off. I’ll fly away.

“In the seaside town, that they forgot to bomb, come come come nuclear bomb.”

Namaste,

J. Lakis

✌🏼💙🖖🏼

PS: I made a Spotify playlist about this place. It’s not bad! It’s chill. I mainly chose the songs by their names, but the music is good, if you like Velvet Underground and music from Thatcherite England.

-JL

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If you or anyone you know has experienced sexual violence please contact RAIIN, for Domestic Violence in the US contact The Hotline. Both are available 24/7 by phone or chat in English and Spanish.

If you or anyone you know has experienced sexual violence please contact RAIIN, for Domestic Violence in the US contact The Hotline. Both are available 24/7 by phone or chat in English and Spanish.