I'm not sure where the best place to post this might be... I'm not even sure that I should post it... But, if we seek catharsis through confession, perhaps this is the best place to attempt to do so... Please, bear with me for a bit; this confession requires more than a few words...
Today was an emotional roller coaster for me the likes of which I have not experienced in some time; I'm still a bit sore from the ride. I will skip over the bits of the day that were frazzled and nice; I suppose they are inconsequential.
It being a Friday afternoon with work mumbo jumbo under control, I decided to check the forums here at WP. I found a response to a message I'd sent RainSong yestereve over some trivial matter, which kicked off a train of events leading to me reading RainSong's blog. After reading back through most of the archives, I found an old posting in which there was a horrific story about a 13 year-old boy with AS who was brutally beaten by two thugs. Apparently, the reasons were the typical mumbo jumbo that he was odd and different.
Upon reading this, I felt something really snap inside of me, emotionally. I found myself hearkening back to my younger days, when, ironically at the same age as the boy who was beaten in the story, I was beaten up by a pack of my "schoolmates", though not so badly as the boy in the story. I was jumped from behind on the long walk home from school (I used to always walk alone), without so much as a clue of warning, or any provocation; I was just sport for the bullies; suffice to say, in the process my nose was broken and I was pelted with several large rocks.
I found myself gripped by a seething rage at reading the story of this happening to someone else, and even worse. I found I could no longer stand to be at work, and left, passing a fellow coworker and completely ignoring her greeting [I'll have to apologize to her later].
I wanted to swing by the grocery on the way home, and for the short drive there, the thought of that boy being beaten like that was burning in my mind. I found myself wanting to give anything to go back in time, and appear behind those thugs just as they were attacking that boy. I relished the thought of taking them both down at once, and dozens of scenarios for how I might cripple and maim them were racing through my mind all at once. I do not wish to give the impression that I am some badass bruiser [I'm not], but neither am I small or weak anymore, and there dwells within me a spirit of rage that is "thermonuclear" at best, one of the many demons I struggle to keep under lock and key from day to day. A few lines from Hamlet come to mind:
"Thou pray'st not well.
I prithee, take thy fingers from my throat;
For, though I am not splenitive and rash,
Yet have I something in me dangerous,
Which let thy wisdom fear: hold off thy hand!"
So, I went into the grocery in a black mood, mostly off in my own world, violent thoughts still racing through my head. I had grabbed the item I was seeking, and was making my to the cashier at the far corner of the store, the one most people don't know about so it is less busy there. As I was passing the magazine racks, someone came around a corner and bumped my shoulder rather roughly; he came from the left, and I was looking at the magazine covers on my right. About half a second after this happened, and it was apparent that the guy was going to continue on without so much as an "excuse me", things slowed down to bullet time; if you've read this far, thank you; here I were the story becomes worth reading.
Without so much as a thought, and without even looking and the fellow who'd bumped into me, my left hand shot out and grabbed him by his left shoulder sleeve, and I spun him around, hard. In my tunnel vision, the first thing I noticed were his large glasses, then the eyes behind them, and the look of stark terror in them. Then I looked at him; he was some late-middle Indian guy, mostly bald, kind of frail. In a thick Indian accent, he mumbled something about being sorry, and not meaning anything by it, and being in a hurry to catch his wife at the cashier. I was focused on his eyes, and the terror in them. Then I realized what I was doing...
I had spun him around so hard, I had ripped his shirt, and I was still clutching a fist-full of the half torn-off sleeve. It was some generic yellow polo shirt, the shade I like to call "Prozac yellow". And then I noticed he was not really looking at me, but at my right hand... Which was drawn back and frozen at the apex of a punch, where it happened to be as I noticed the terror in this guys eyes. And then I realized what I was about to do; it was not just any punch; I realized I had intended to hit him in the throat, in a manner that is designed to collapse windpipe and arteries; a death blow. And it was just the first in the sequence of blows I had plotted out in my mind; the second was to have been a close elbow-smash to the nose, also intended to be a death blow. I will not say more. I realized that in the moment that poor fellow bumped into me, he became one of those thugs who beat and maimed that 13 year old boy with AS; I cannot imagine the hellfires he saw burning in my eyes...
Once I realized what I did, and what I was about to do, those fires froze over; I could amost feel myself physically shrink. I let him go, and he stumbled back a step, still trapped like a deer in the headlights. I put out my hands, open palms out in an attempt to gesture piece, and blurted out, "I am so sorry! Soooo sorry!" He relaxed just slightly, and there was an awkward moment where we stood there staring at each other, neither of us sure what to do. Then I noticed his ripped shirt again, and told him that it was my mistake, please let me give you something for that; I fumbled around and grabbed two 20's out of my wallet, then made it three, and grabbed his right hand [which was limp and cold], and shoved the money into it. Then I tried to give a friendly gesture by patting him on both shoulders, and said one more time, "I'm so sorry; please forgive me." He squeaked out something like, no worries, and scurried off.
I looked around, and noticed nobody had witnessed our altercation, which seemed like an eternity to me, but couldn't have lasted more than several seconds in real time. I hurried to checkout, and left.
On the drive home, I was haunted what I had almost done... After some thought, I realized I had almost become very much like the thugs who I hated and wanted to destroy. What the hell happened to me? I don't go around attacking people, honest. Then, as I calmed down and banished the violent thoughts I was having to some dark corner of my mind, I found myself thinking about the situation from the opposite direction. I found myself wondering about the boy who was beaten; and I found that what I really wanted more than anything, was to be able to go back in time and be a friend to him in his time of need; insofar as people with AS can form friendships [I notice it's some more than others]. But, just to be there for him in any way that I could, to let him know that he was not alone, to make him feel better somehow.
I wonder where he is today; I wonder if he's doing OK. Gods, I hope so... But I fear that that beating will be a demon that will haunt him for the rest of his days. I confess, I know what that feels like... And, after all this, I confess I'd still like to put the smack down on those thugs... My mind is spinning...
Thanks for listening.
Good fortune,
- Icarus
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Please forgive me if, in the heat of battle, I sometimes forget which side I'm on.
27 Jul 2007, 8:13 pm
