Conflict

It was so loud and ear splitting that birds flew up in a clamor from their comfortable perches in the trees, rising in great squawking swarms that ominously blackened the sky like a huge cloud passing in front of a swollen red sun. The entire neighborhood ran to their windows to nervously peek from behind the safety of closed blinds or up from the protection of dense shrubs, around thickets of trees and through the cracks of wooden fences - a couple of the very boldest and bravest of them even daringly walked, with obvious strained caution, towards the commotion and the violence. Mothers tightly grasped their small children in their confused and nervous panic - while fathers herded their families behind them in a protective stance.  The bloodcurdling screams of death, pain and determination ran like chills of icy cold water through the trembling bones of every man, woman and child within earshot – and earshot was as wide as a mile. What they witnessed would dramatically change their lives forever. What they witnessed was nothing short of war. 

Regardless the natural passivity of a personality, there will come a time when the only appropriate action is conflict. The greatest stories of conquest and heroism arise from the everyday-man’s instinctive animal ability to dig deep within his soul and the recesses of his mind to tap the necessary fight-or-flight adrenaline in order to perform super-human feats in the face of impossible opposition.  I am not speaking of the crazy quests of Captain Ahab or the practiced and perfected moves of professional fighters. I am speaking of the rage that dwells within all of us. I am speaking of the animalistic ferocity that resides within the center of our entire being and once unleashed, will ravage and devour everything in its path. Seriously, I am talking about a lot of anger here (I hope that you are appreciating the effort).

The air was a wavy and dizzily stop motion home-made-film that only eyes pressurized by panic, anger and immense pain can produce - filled with water, mud, blood and shouts of rage and pain. I am screaming obscenities like mother-f-ing Samuel L. Jackson in every mother-f-ing movie that he has ever been in. I am demon possessed and filled with murder. I am as stealth and athletic as a turtle on its back (with a broken leg), screaming like a mad woman giving birth. I violently and spastically rolled towards my assailant, my attacker, my enemy. Fighting through the grip of a massive seizure brought on from falling and smacking my head on a rock; the pain of a busted and bleeding knee and a throbbing, freshly smacked and already kind of soggy noggin. I stretched out my left arm (my only working appendage) and gripped the very sharp stone that is now very slippery from head blood.

Summoning every ounce of strength - pulling as hard as possible against the restraints of nausea, fatigue, dizziness and pain, I laid into my foe with every fiber of my being. I was Thor's mighty hammer. I was the Hulk’s rage. I was an incredible dork that watches too many cartoons with his kids and should probably focus more on current events and environmental issues, but of course I find them both depressing and discouraging and I already have a hard enough time with depression issues without focusing on a crappy congress, bleak future and… Sorry, where was I? I was an angry, fairly gimpy and kind of crying just a little in a very manly way from the pain and frustration, badass ninja.

Several minutes later, after what felt like a three-hour battle, the yard lay in complete waste. I stood in the middle of carnage shaking from effort and hoarsely gasping from the cries of battle. A wreckage of lawn, dirt, brick, blood and pottery pieces littered the ground as if a bomb had exploded and left only me – just me standing and bleeding over my fallen enemy. My provoker and object of my hate lay dead at my feet. 

Slowly, and with caution, the neighbors approached to stare in wonder at the pitiful corpse that was broken, battered, gashed, twisted and grotesquely strewn across the yard. Waiting for the wild in my eyes to recede, my wife finally approached and touched my shoulder. “Do we need to go?” she asked.

“Yes,” I said.

“Are you really hurt?” she asked.

“I am alright. I just wish the neighbors would stop starring at me,” I answered.

“They have probably never seen anyone kill and mutilate a garden hose because it tripped them before,” she said.

“It didn’t just trip me! It was like the fourth time! The damn thing was possessed and needed to die! Look at my knee! It kept coiling up and…” etc, etc and on and on... I protested.

In the end, when all was said and done, I had succeeded in destroying the demon hose and alienating every single smiley-faced neighbor before I was eventually banned permanently from watering the yard (and from every movable appliance with a cord or hose attached). But sometimes late at night, when nobody is watching me, I still fight with hoses. Just kidding – I don’t do that anymore.