Walkin' Round Waitin'

Hey, Fat Mack, how ya doin?

Good, Bamboo, what’s new with you?

Same old, same old, you know. Glad to see you here. I don’t want no fight but I will buy you a beer.

What you wanna be that way for, Bamboo? Yeah, thanks, I’ll take that but don’t worry ‘bout me and don’t believe what you hear. See, before this I never started a fight. I just finished ‘em.

I can tell. Nice shiner, there. Draft?

Yep. No, man, you weren’t around so you don’t know. I was always pushed into that stuff and everything anyway. I even punched out my old man just to show him I wouldn’t take no shit. He deserved it the way he treated me and my brothers and sisters. That’s old news, but you ask around, after that, everybody knew I could finish a fight they started. It don’t take long to earn that kinda respect.

Respect is a good thing to have, ain’t it? Especially from friends.

Well, looking ‘round town now, I got nothin’ but enemies. Most of my so-called friends turned on me at one time or another. Even my brothers, man, my brothers won’t have nothin’ to do with me. Can you believe that? They all blamed me for this and that but I was mostly a victim of my circumstances like they said. I know what it means to be on the wrong side of things and how that shit can just spiral out of control.

Don’t we all, my friend, don’t we all?

Um-hmm … but I knew that, I ain’t stupid. I saw it, I didn’t just ignore it but I for a while I decided enough of that shit and I just started layin’ low all the time, ya know, hidin’ out and all that, just tryin’ to take care of my own.

Hard to imagine doing things differently and hard to figure how we choose our paths.

Well, yeah, son of a bitch, I can tell you exactly how this happened. One day my girl says, Mack, why you waitin’ to get killed? You gotta defend yourself! You can’t be just walkin’ round waitin’! Shit, she sorta convinced me of that, ya know? She said she didn’t know if people’s really out to get me or what but she didn’t want proof of all that to be me in a body bag, that’s what she said, to see me laid up in the hospital and stuff and everything. And then she said, what about her? She told me about her friend, whatever her name was, and how she got all messed up because of what her brothers did. What if me backin’ off put her in danger? Like somebody would threaten her to get at me. She’s like family and what she said really hit home, I guess.

Well, umm, family is like, uh, protecting your family is important, man.

No shit! So, I went out and I found the biggest baddest dude, the one guy nobody had the balls to confront, and I kicked the crap out of him right here in the street over there for no good reason. He saw my eyes and he was scared, man. You shoulda seen ‘em! I wanted to show everybody that I wasn’t to be messed with and that I wasn’t gonna just walk ‘round waitin’ for him to get me first. All I really wanted was for them all to just leave me and my girl alone, ya know?

That was over there in the old Baptist Church parking lot, right?

Yep, right there … how’d they say that, it was like a goddamn backfire, some kinda chain reaction that you didn’t want in the first place? That’s what happened, man. I can’t go nowhere now. The cops, man, everybody blames me and suddenly everybody wants a piece and they even let my girl know about it, the damn bitch! This shit is happenin’ like every night, like twenty-four-seven, ya know?

Uhh, yeah. Another brew?

Sure, thanks, man. Now, listen here Bamboo, can you tell me, can somebody tell me if I had just minded my own business it woulda been different? Like if I’d a just waited for that dude to pick his fight instead of going after him first, the blame woulda went his way instead of mine and I wouldn’t be in the shit I’m in today?

Well, I heard he walked away at first, that you went after him and forced the issue.

Yeah, right, and now it’s like it’s all my fault instead. I can’t believe that. It’s like you don’t care, man, it’s like you’re forgettin’ it was gonna happen either way, no matter what I did or didn’t do. There’s no difference! If I hid out or if I went after him first, it was still gonna go down. But now it’s this fault and blame things that’s all on me, you see? I’m screwed either way if I do or if I don’t. Well, somebody’s screwed, anyway, I guess.

Apparently so.

So, now I’m going out and I’m telling everybody, don’t be like that, don’t do what I did unless you just wanna add to your bag of shit. No way, not me now. There’s gonna be fightin’ and you better be ready to finish it. There’s gonna be pain, ya know? And that damn bitch is gonna be flappin’ her gums to no end about it. But don’t listen to her and just be walkin’ round waitin’ for it, don’t go findin’ it, let somebody else take the fault and the blame for startin’ that crap. Jesus Christ!

Good advice. A lesson for us all, I suppose.

Yeah, but there’s something about the order to it that I can’t for the life of me figure out, man. If you get pushed you gotta push back and that’s ok but it’s like, I don’t know, you just can’t get caught pushing first or something. It’s some grade school bullshit, man. Fault and blame is the like the key to this whole deal and you gotta let somebody else take it. It’s better that way, Bamboo, I’m tellin’ you.

I hear ya, Mack, I hear ya.

Cheers,

Mb