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The Note: I have put off writing this, because the person I measure myself against is a US Navy SEAL, and I know he is going to be pissed at me when he reads this. All I can say in my favor is that I was there to observe, not to change. On with the show . . .
Until this month, I have never been scared by people. I've been in scary situations. At age 17, while hitch-hiking from Taupo to Napier [both Aotearoa, for those wondering], I had a driver pull off the road and pull me into the back of his van. He was Maori, as am I, and I calmly told him that the only way he was going to get what he wanted was to kill me, and then I would haunt him every day of his life. If he had not been Maori, I'd like to think I could have found another way to reason him out of hurting me.
You can't reason with crazy.
While visiting a friend on this Great American Adventure, I got to meet her cousin, whom she had already warned me was crazy. Long story short, he got angry, I probably responded unwisely, she told him to leave her house and he attacked her. At which stage, the Kiwi being the Kiwi, I stepped between them, hands held high, not in attack mode, and said "stop."
You can't reason with crazy.
I have the bruises where he took hold of me before he threw me out of the way. He then went outside and started firing his guns. I went to bed with a screwdriver under my pillow, just in case. (Yes, I do know where the carotid artery resides.)
As this was happening, I was remembering an I.O.U. my SEAL buddy once gave me, and how he worded it. I could have called him, he would have dealt with it for me, but he would have been disappointed that I couldn't handle it myself.
I'm capable of killing, as in I know how to, but I can't put down a sick kitten. Or a sick dog, as in this case. AND . . . I felt partially responsible because I didn't realize my friend meant crazy-insane and not crazy-fun.
You can't reason with crazy.
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when I saw the next day that he had hurt the bike (ripped a mirror off), I reconsidered my stance on taking a life
ReplyDeleteHateful things done in a 'fit of rage' are scary enough, but thought-out acts of violence and hate are eerily frightening. Most people I've met who get enraged calm down after a bit and are mostly regretful of their actions/words. A calm, thought-out plan of hate and hurt scares me right down into my bones.Returning to the scene of rage hours later to vandalize and terrorize....as in Tracie's broken mirror and my car caved in from having been kicked, T-shirts which had been gifts, now muddied and carefully laid out in my driveway.....Send shivers down my spine, the likes of which I've never known. True that "You can't reason with crazy,".....I think it's difficult to reason with hate as well.
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