Most of our lives are the workaday, humdrum experience shared by tens of millions… we get up, go to work/school, get through the day, come home, and go to sleep. But ocassionally our lives form a story, a series of events occuring in a seamlessly narrative flow whereupon after it is done you look back and say “Damn, it was just like being in a movie.”
These movie moments can take place over any length of time… from 30 seconds to a span of months, it matters not… from a car accident where you spun around 3 or 4 times, to a relationship, knowingly doomed from the start, to a challenge that you met and overcome… it’s happened to all of us.
So what’s yours?
It was the sixth grade and I was your regular… well, “geek” was the word that came to mind, but “unknown” was more like it as I was as bored with the geek circles as I was with the popular kids, the stoners, etc… by the time I got into high school, my apathy had increased to the point where I participated in zero extra-curricular activities, went to zero sporting events, danced at zero dances, etc. And if you think that is something, in Georgia back then, high school lasted for five years instead of the normal 3 or 4 - imagine going to high school for five years and not having a single thing listed by your name in the yearbook during your senior year. In short: I just didn’t want to be * bothered.
Unfortunately, in the sixth grade there was a guy by the name of… Michael, iirc. Mike was one of those insufferable bastards we all knew in school - the bully who impressed his friends with his fists and his mouth, particularly against the quiet, geeky types. Luckily I was able to avoid him for the first 2 quarters of school (um, 1.5 semesters?), but a showdown was brewing and it came in March.
Now, I’m a lover and not a fighter ( 
) but I have been in a few schoolyard scrapes before… but that was no help as Mike was a fighter, a fighter who had the sense to wait a few seconds expertly sizing up his opponent before going in for the kill.* So when the time and date was set, I gotta tell you I was scared shiiteless. Backing down was an option; going home by a different route was too an option… after all, a few other kids had done so w/o getting beat up by Mike. Why not I? Why should I get my ass pounded? Yeah, he’ll go back to harassing me, but is that so bad?
Yes, oh yeah, that would be a hundred times worse than an ass-beating. Regardless of what happened, I at least was going to show up - I wasn’t going to be like Brian Hambrick, who didn’t show up for his fight and became the meekest guy in school after that, the kid that even the losers picked on - a state that existed for the next 6 years and likely into college. Fvck that!
So I got to the fight, on the corner of Midvale and Cliffchest, and Mike was already there. We took off our jackets as the other kids stood back, forming the circle, and putting up our fists, the fight started.
Ow! ****! Damn, that hurt! Mike came out a little strong and a lot cocky, hitting me on the shoulder and the ear. I countered with a couple of jabs, one of which connected a bit because Mike backed off a little for a couple of seconds. The kids were yelling at the both of us of course, but I have no idea who’s (if any) side the crowd was on… usually they just want to see a good fight.
As Mike backed off, the look in his eye made it clear all of a sudden: If this doesn’t end soon, I’m going to get seriously hurt. Hoping to get one good shot in, I looked over Mike’s shoulder as he came in, pointed behind him and yelled
“LOOK!!!”
Whereupon the dumb sunofa***** actually looked behind him, allowing me to land the most perfect of rights smack into his jaw - the greatest punch I have ever thrown. Sadly it wasn’t my punch that knocked him out, it was his head hitting the pavement… but he was knocked out cold: I had beaten the bully!
Mike got up after a few minutes, groggy as all hell, and had to get one or two of his friends to help him home. Me, I just walked on home with my one friend, Chris Forsyth, talking about Star Wars and stuff.
I was never picked on again for the rest of my school days. Oh, I had people I had issues with, and one or two more fights, but it wasn’t the same, you know?
As seen through my sixth-grade eyes.