Enemies, Part I

This one is very closely tied to “The Mercy of a Warrior.”
Uncle Bill used to laugh whenever I went on about my “enemies.” I’d ask him what was so funny but he’d never answer me. At least, not until things had been settled between the young man in “Mercy” and myself.
Right after class that day, he asked me if I’d thanked my enemy; I just stared, “Do what?”
I couldn’t have been more surprised if he’d just told me to go kiss my dog. He just smiled and asked again, “Did you thank him?”
“Thank him for what?”
“Teaching you”
O.K., whatever, he taught ME something?
Uncle Bill let me stew that one over until the next class when he asked me again if I’d thanked him. Alright, a joke is one thing, but this has got to stop now!
Uncle Bill told me that he was quite serious; that I needed to thank my enemy. I stood there, looking at him for a few moments and then told Uncle Bill that if he could give me a good enough reason I’d consider doing it. He sat me down and told me that I had to be careful about whom I honored with the title “enemy;” that anyone whom I would consider my enemy had to be at least as intelligent as me, or wise enough to teach me.
So what did that useless, racist, punk teach me?
Uncle Bill stared me dead in the eye and said, “Mercy and self control.”
Oooooooooohhhhhh no he didn’t, he taught me aggravation, he taught me insult, he taught me what racism looked like and he taught me to cheap shot people.
Uncle Bill smiled coolly and asked, “If he hadn’t taught you those things, would you have learned about mercy?”
In that moment, things got very complicated.
Ummmmmm, no.
“If he hadn’t provoked you, would you have learned self control?”
Wellll, maybe.
“But not to the level that you did, right?”
No
“Would you have learned what racism looks like, up close and personal?”
Probably not, not like that, anyway.
“So then, there were at least three things that he taught you, right?”
I’ve always hated it when Uncle Bill was correct.
In a move that totally baffled everyone, except Uncle Bill and Uncle Frank, I walked over to the punk and said, “Excuse me sensei.”
As expected, he just gave me a blank look and said, “Huh?”
Yep, he was as confused as I’d been
“I’d like to thank you for the lessons that you gave me”
Now he was really baffled, but when I bowed, he returned the bow.
Things were never quite the same for us after that and when he’d heard that I’d been offered my 1st dan (the first level of the master rankings, the coveted black belt) but had turned it down, he stopped me and asked why, when I told him that I hadn’t mastered my temper sufficiently to accept it. He just stared at me then told me, “I think you should have accepted it sir.” Then he bowed to me, holding the bow until I returned it.
I had become more careful of whom I referred to as my “enemy” by then, but after that, I decided that no one I was fighting in Aurora was deserving of the title.
Until I met Steve A.
We met in high school, as freshmen; one of the first things he did was look at me and comment, “Who let the gook loose?” His compadres seemed to find his comment endlessly amusing. I just favored him with a slight glance and said, “I’m a chink, not a gook, the least you could do is to make certain you’re using the correct racial epithet.” His friends laughed even harder and his face flared red.
At lunch, I was at the basketball court behind the school, with everyone else who smoked, unlike everyone else, however, I was smoking an A&C Grenadier.
Well, Dad always did say that if you’re going to do something, do it right and do it with style.
So there I was, enjoying the fine smells of autumn and the taste of that Grenadier, when this imbecile smashes the cigar from my hand with a basketball; breaking it in half.
My ..... last ..... cigar.
Steve walked up to me, smirking, and asked, “So, what you gonna do about it .... chink?”
Jab .... jab .... left cross .... right uppercut
Any questions?
His “friends” backed off, leaving him lying on the ground. I just salvaged what I could of my cigar and went behind the auto shop to finish it. When he didn’t show his face in shop, I vanished from the shop (not a terribly difficult thing to do, vanishing) and went back, he was still lying there. I applied a couple of kappo-jitsu pressure points and brought him around; then I checked his eyes, pupils unequal.
“C’mon bud, you’re going to the nurse.”
His eyes wandered a bit, but focused when he heard the word “nurse.”
“No man, I can’t go to the nurse.”
“Look, if you’ve been doing a little pot, she’s cool about that.”
He grabbed my arm and said, “I can’t go to the nurse”
“Alright then, but you’re concussed, I have to take you somewhere”
“Don’t you know anyone you could take me to?”
“What about your parents?”
“They won’t even notice I’m gone.”
I didn’t find out why he said that until years later, but I made a few phone calls; took him to a doctor friend of mine, who had his daughter, an R.N., keep an eye on Steve until morning.
The next day, at lunch, he came over and sat down across the table from me. As we ate, he quietly told me that a few of his buddies were planning to “meet” me in the upstairs boys’ room. I just as quietly thanked him for the information. After lunch I made a quick stop in the school shop before going to the boys’ room. They never did figure out why I had that section of rebar stuck in my waistband.
All through school the pattern would hold the same, Steve would try to beat me in a fight, he’d get hurt and then his “friends” would try to get the drop on me and he wouldn’t let them. He kept insisting that he’d either beat me himself, or he wouldn’t, but he wasn’t going to do it with their help. I found out later that this was an exception to his usual pattern of behavior.
One of my girlfriends, one of only two that I’d had who were from Aurora, asked me why I tolerated his behavior, and his insistence on eating lunch with me. Without missing a beat I told her that he was my enemy and that it was a normal situation.
It may have been my imagination, but I would swear that he walked taller, and was more direct in his eye contact with people after that.
At graduation he came up to me and told me, “One of these days, I’m going to beat you, you know.”
I had spoken with a friend about Steve and made some arrangements, so I handed him a business card and told him, “I’m sure you will Steve, and if you talk to this man, he might be able to help you do that.”
That was the last time I saw him and he was glowing with pride.
We never did have that return match.
Life intervened, I went into the service where I found a whole new type of trouble to get into. Steve gave up on his music (so I’m told) and became a trucker.
They also told me that he died in a trucking accident somewhere near Cincinnati; the truly sad thing about it was that, according to the sons of a friend of his, I was in town on a construction job at the same time. I just wish that I’d known he was in that hospital bed. At least he wouldn’t have had to die alone.
An honored enemy deserves that much respect, at the least.
Vaya con Dios Steve.


It's not about anger - it's about peace
It's not about power - it's about grace
It's not about knowing your enemy - it's about knowing yourself.

the Monk