So, a while back I got an email sent via Goodreads that was my pal Allison’s review of a book. In her review, she revealed an interesting tidbit of information about herself:
For the book club I'm going to bring my list of things to do before I die and see what people think. I still haven't achieved one that Ben makes fun of me for..."get a black eye"...but really, how can you say you've lived if you've never had a black eye? So if you ever get the chance, like you and I happen to be wrestling or boxing or playing baseball together or something, go ahead and bean me one.
Which pretty much sums up why she is so awesome. Then we arranged to have a wrestling match sometime so she can get a black eye and I can get a bloody nose, and then we'll take gruesome, bloody pictures. It'll be sweet. (Her words.) :)
Anyway, all this talk of good, old-fashioned eye-blacking got me thinking. I can already check it off of my list. Twice actually. Once when I was a kid I went sledding and had a pretty awesome wipe-out right into a rock, and got the biggest goose-egg in the middle of my forehead that I’ve ever seen, before or since. (I have pictures to document; too bad they’re not with me, or I would definitely show them off. But perhaps my mom will find them for me and scan them in, and then I’ll post them.) After a few days, that turned into two black eyes. And soon into greeny-yellow red eyes. I looked a lot like the this guy. Beastly.
I remember begging my mom one morning not to make me go to school because I looked so horrific. She made me go anyway.
And another time, actually it was the night of high school graduation (well, Kami’s high school graduation, my high school ditching), a bunch of friends and I were playing night games in our backyard. During one thrilling dash to home-free (the trampoline) I ran into a fairly heavy-set kid and came out of it with a big swollen eye. I started a new job a couple days later and felt rather silly sporting my shiner.
Of course, one of my favorite black eye stories was this one of Brett’s. It included a short-lived but merry fight, a stitches show, and later a pretty (fairly small) black eye.
(This particular picture was after the carnival face-painters had made a little “Guess which eye is the TRULY injured one” game.)
But one story I got to remembering—the one I would like to share with you today—was one that included an actual fight. Sort of. You see, it was way back …well, maybe I won’t tell just how old I was, because I don’t think I actually want anyone to know just how much I should have known better.
Way back when, when my cousins Brian and Devonee were visiting us from their cold Northern country. I think we all tried to stay up the entire night the previous night, and I think we made it until after we did our paper route… I think. Anyway, the next day we girls- Kami, Devonee, and I, were lazing around, watching a movie, while Wyatt and Brian were outside somewhere, doing something. (Yes, now you see how this is such an awesome story…the details are all so clear and riveting.) Anyhow, they came in and told us that some kids had been picking a fight with them and they needed us to come back with them so we could, well, essentially so we could either beat them up or make them think we could.
Now, I called three people to try to get details for this story (which was really cool, because I haven’t talked to Brian in almost a decade. Actually, I think we did see other briefly before he went on his mission, but anyway many years), and despite my good reporter skills, I couldn’t come up with a good solid reason how the whole argument got started. Brian thought perhaps it had something to do with our dog (which is a reasonable guess), and according to Wyatt—the instigator of this whole debacle, “we saw some guys, they said some crap, we came home and got you…” So, there you go.
Well, I do not know why, but somehow we let ourselves be led down such a disastrous path. Perhaps because our sleep-deprived brains were functioning below par, or perhaps it is true what Kami said, and that we were in the middle of watching the movie ‘The Outsiders’ and, having been so recently influenced by the violent nature of it, we were not showing our normal impeccable good sense. (Oooh, I like that. Shifting the blame to the media is always a good move.)
(A picture of Sodapop Curtis. Because, well… why not?)
ANYwhoo… we went to the appointed place— the middle school grounds—and awaited the kids. Who had gone and got THEIR older brothers. (Kami, Devonee, and I all find it fairly amusing that our brothers came and recruited GIRLS to help them fight.) And then we saw one of them with a knife. And then we decided to go home.
(I was going to wait until tomorrow to post this, but I think I rather like the idea of leaving you hanging. So, until tomorrow…)
