whistling in the dark

BadBadMan

“I’m a bad man!” Mohammed Ali, at 22 years old after beating Sonny Liston.

When I was five, I was across the street watching the “older boys” play a game of basketball in the Paul’s driveway. It was something I did a lot, watching other kids and people have fun and live. All of the kids in that intersection of 46th and J Street that comprised my whole universe at that age, were either older or younger than I was. So, I was accustomed to watching.

That day I watched Marie Paul pick up a rock and for no explainable reason throw it at a passing car, as in a car passing ten feet away and with nowhere to run and hide. Her rock found its mark because at that distance even a 10 year old girl has deadly aim. It made a thud on the side of the car that caused the driver to immediately screech to a halt. He jumped out of his vehicle looking like the killings would now begin and screamed “who threw that fucking rock?!

I knew the picture of a man who was already having a bad day, and he was it. He had huge sweat stains under his striped button up shirt with his too-tight tie. As he moved toward all of us, his comb-over that had dislodged during his exit from his car flopped over off the side of his head and flapped as he stomped his way forward, like a Frisbee jutting from just above his ear.

He was not a man accustomed to outbursts because he didn’t pull off the marauding alpha male act well. As he paced back and forth and spit while he screamed trying to find the offender, he mixed up his words and he shook uncontrollably. But, what really gave him away was the fear. When he got close I could see it; he was in stark fear of the seven children he had just confronted and his eyes were saying “why did I get out of the car? I should have just kept going”. And, for another day, cut and run vs. continuing to fund a bad investment.

I wasn’t the only one who saw it. No one ran and no one cried. We just watched this disappointing display of futility play out. When he had a break in his diatribe, Liz, Marie’s younger sister stepped toward him and in beautiful blonde nine-year-old freckled splendor said “I did it, I threw the fucking rock! You! Should get in your car! And leave!” while she was screaming it she was gesturing wildly with her hand pointing at him, then his car, and finally up the street that would be his salvation if he would only accept it.

Dead silence. World quit turning, birds dropped from the sky, motherfucker got in his car without another word and left.

Big boys immediately went back to playing basketball, Marie and Liz went back to talking but for me the world hadn’t started turning again yet, I had seen the “answer”. Being in trouble has only the power you give it and other peoples anger towards you doesn’t have to mean “run”. Also, that a war of attrition is won in having a little more courage than your opponent and that greeting someone’s anger with a bigger faster stronger anger, even if contrived is very powerful indeed. Taking the blame Like Liz did for Marie can have its own rewards. There is power, generosity and grace all at once.

It would be nice to say that from that day forward I was able to practice it, but quite the opposite was true. I was still a scared little boy frozen by the fear of anyone being angry at me. But the answer was always in my thoughts, always where I wanted to be. And, as with anything else you put into practice over time it became my new reality.

I made my first consistent attempts at it beginning in the fourth grade under the thumb of a teacher who wanted only my complete desperation. Her burning hate for me came the second day of that school year when she asked the class who the second president of the United States had been. I answered “Brigham Young”

I couldn’t understand the look of hate that passed over her face and continued on in her actions towards me that year, particularly because my dumbass thought he was the second president. I didn’t “believe” he was, but that is a different rant for a different day. Or not, let’s see how this goes.

An honest answer, responded to with that much vitriolic venom, while being just like a dinner conversation at home was a complete surprise to me at school. It was that kind of “my life is never going to be the same after this” surprise.

While I didn’t understand the mechanics of how her treating me like a lying, thieving, evil, manipulative piece-of-shit would make want to be one, that is how it transpired. It wasn’t long before I was poking the lion with a stick every chance I got and more and more losing the fear of her anger and hate towards me, and at the same time my hate towards myself grew incrementally. I came to believe the lie that I truly was bad-evil-damaged.

That’s the thing about being hated, despised, loathed and distrusted. It starts out disappointing and painful because really, isn’t what we all want is to be accepted, appreciated and understood? But, when faced inevitably day after day with the opposite, whether passively by those without the courage of their convictions, or in the case of an inescapable oppressor, really if you are fortunate in the end you realize the power you have over someone who feels those things about you, and as with any human adaptability measure you begin to use it to your benefit. Using it to your benefit doesn’t mean winning. It merely means getting into the phone booth to fight with them. I love my chances in a fight in a phone booth, but I sure as hell won’t leave unscathed. Hence the “attrition”

And so it goes, I became the fucker. I set out to commit every evil at a very young age.

I’m a checklist guy. I may not always write it down but I always have a list I am trying to finish and loose ends I want to put to sleep. I always have goals and ambitions I am working toward, but not many of which probably match yours. How far I got on that list is of no consequence and is not the reason for this vomit. My point, and I always have one, is that I grew to be a man who doesn’t fear your anger, your hate or your judgment or my guilt. I didn’t do it because I am strong, quite the opposite is true. I became numb to those things because I inspired justly all of those emotions in everyone I came into contact with. I didn’t need my fourth grade teacher to come along for the rest of my life because I would make a new one in every person I met. I became my own self fulfilling prophecy.

I started my way “back” in 1988. For the last 27 years I have been working on a different list, a list to reverse those decisions I made in the fourth grade. At the top of the list was to become “Joe Average”.

My God I tried so hard; years of therapy, 14 years of church, button up shirts and ties, suburbs, walking, talking and acting like Joe. I have to tell you, it was a miserable fucking existence. I tried to be afraid of people being mad at me, I tried to care if you hate me, I tried to be your kind of good so you wouldn’t judge me. I even gave guilt a shot.

I was miserable because it always remained an act. I learned in my search for a God that I never was evil. I have practiced evil, I am fully capable of evil and truly it is my rational belief that there is no personage devil. The devil is in our hearts and minds as is evidenced in our thoughts and actions. Just like my Joe Average, my hope for a God has also allowed me to disavow your devil, I can act like your evil designate, but I’m not him.

Wait, that only leaves me to blame…..

I take the blame well. I learned from my 9 year old freckled hero many years ago it’s benefits, I have studied and studied what it takes to manufacture some like me. I have come to know my “self” and that knowledge I gained tells me I do indeed have good in me, it’s the evil that was the lie. But, all the while I’m still taking the blame. Aren’t I valiant? Aren’t I courageous? Aren’t I heroic? Fuck me I’m not sure.

I will take the blame for anyone I feel responsibility for; I will be the bad guy and the villain. It’s an act I know well, the part suits me. I love the power and control and I still love what comes with it. I’m not afraid of anyone, I’m incapable of shame and embarrassment. I have a very low “fuckit” factor. Why not carry a load that is light for me, but crushing to others?

From almost any discernable standpoint, I understand why it ends up my fault anyway. I understand the way the rest of humanity comes to their decisions.

There you have it. I did it, I threw the fucking rock. I’ll get in my car and leave…