Turning Off the Wheel

This post is a combination of two seperate posts I was working on, and they just kind of came together. It's deeply personal to me and if it makes no sense to you, don't be alarmed. It's mostly for me anyway.



A few days ago I was involved in an online discussion about the effectiveness of a South African Knife system, Piper. There was much hoo-hawing about “Would this really work” “Is it really the ultimate thing” blah bla-blah blah blah.

I remembered a person who I knew in the reform schools and orphanages I was in as a teenager. For the sake of a name, I’ll call him “Sam”.

Sam and I knew each other back in the reform school I was sent to in Charleston, South Carolina, called “C-Stop” and he often saved my ass in times when running my mouth got me into trouble. In fact, if I was in deep shit, I knew Sam would pull me out. He made few friends, and the ones he had were kept at a distance. The two of us were paired off in the same room, so we were forced to associate through proximity than any other reason.

However, he was also responsible for much of the dastardly shit that I did as well, and we pulled MANY stunts and rogueries together. You could bet that if I was in handcuffs, so was Sam. He was a natural fighter, no frills, straight-up. He was uncontrollable and fearless, the kind of person who hated for no other reason than convenience.

The recent uproar across the Martial Arts blogs got me thinking about Sam again, and I decided to look him up and see him again. Although we hadn’t spoken to or seen each other for over a decade or more, I knew just where to find him. The journey was tiresome, not something you want to make every year, and I was apprehensive as I approached his gate. He lived far out from modern society, hidden away in what could pass for an abandoned shack if it were spruced up.

I last saw Sam about 15 years ago, and life had since not been kind to him. Always ready to throw the first punch, his face was a mass of scars and he had not aged well. In fact, he looked as if he had somehow accelerated his growth into the twilight years, although we were the same age at the reform school we met at.

Sam was sitting in his favorite rocker on the porch when I arrived. He had no electricity, hence no phone, and no way of knowing I was coming. A smirk spread across his face as I got closer and he called out a greeting.

“Weeelll now…If it isn’t Mr. Big Stuff himself. You get tired of all them lights in the city?”

“Heya Sammie, betcha never thought you’d see me again.”

“Welup, you just never know whose gonna do what anymore. Anyways, been awhile ‘tween you ‘n me hasn’t it?”

Sam pulled a mason jar of clear liquid from underneath a nearby shelf. “You too much stuff to ’member this?” He sloshed the contents around and I knew in an instant what it was: White Lightning. Moonshine. The single malt Scotch whiskey of the South. Smoother than silk with a kick like an NFL all-star punter, I had ingested quite a few liters of this stuff in my youth. I took a swallow from the offered stash, and felt the familiar, immediate warmth that seemed to travel upwards to my brain instead of towards my stomach. I grimaced. Sam was watching me closely, and cackled when he saw my expression. I knew what was coming next. “You ‘member old Toby Miller, from Conway?”

Oh yes, I remembered him. Us hooligans had unknowingly gotten ahold of some bad shine in Charleston. It had been distilled through a radiator to give it a “Kick”. Toby Miller had taken the first swig & immediately fell to the ground clutching his head & screaming that his brain was on fire. It was our only warning about the shine. Toby would permanently lose his sight because of it, and I would never forget the screaming.

I sucked another mouthful of the potion down in Toby’s memory, and Sam clapped his hands together and cackled delightedly. “Well boy, you may have gone all civilized on us, but I reckon you ain’t forgot the woods anytime soon!”

“I was born here Sam, it wouldn’t have slipped my mind.”

“Well, ‘ya just never know. We get some people, come down from the city and lord, you never seen the like…People with deeper roots’n you, church every Sunday, pot roast and collards, but they drive off to Atlanta or somewheres and they come back actin’ like they just landed here from Mars. More I see it, more I just stay out here. It’s peaceful. A man can hear himself think out here.”

Looking around, I had to agree with him. With what we had grown up with, I desired less interaction with other humans myself, and I could see Sam tucking himself away out here as a safety for others just as much as himself. One day we were in downtown Columbia trying to think of a way to get some food, and I saw him casually stab a man in the face and take his wallet while he lay on the ground screaming and clutching his head. He then took the money and bought us a couple of sandwiches from the local Subway, just across the street from where his victim lay in a pool of spreading red fluid. This is the kind of Sociopathic behavior he always exhibited, calculated and thoughtless.

“So, ‘zackly why ARE you here?” My man Sam was never a one for overt pleasantries.

“Well, out of all the people that I know, you are the most…Efficient, I guess is the right word…At fighting. There is no bravado in your method, you just move and kill. I have seen all manner of Kung Foolery in the world, and have never seen one style or system match you capabilities…But I know you never really trained anything! How did you do it back then? What did you know that all these people didn’t?”

“You came all the way out here to ask me THAT? Boy, you may have some books in your head, but you still be as dumb as a bag of hammers. I don’t know how I did it, I just DID it.”

“But Sam, nobody is BORN knowing this shit, it has to be taught. Even if it’s indirectly, it’s still a learned method, not an inherited one.”

“Well, attitude goes a long way, as you well know.” Sam replied. “It ain’t the size of the dog in the fight, etcetera, and etcetera.”

“So, okay, how does that explain your knife ability?”

“Well, when did you ever see me pull it out in plain sight? Or for that matter give a bunny a chance to run? Some ‘o them bastards never even knew what happened until they woke up on th’ operatin’ table. It ain’t like I ever planned on getting’ into a FAIR FIGHT.”

“But, you knew how to do it…You actually survived other people trying to hurt you & all you had was sometimes nothing more than a broken bottle, or an icepick. What did you do to teach yourself this way?”

Sam looked at me like I had just landed from the Moon.

“Sheeit boy, all you gotta do is get close. Everythin’ else is purely will and opportunity. Look, everybody is pretty much built the same, arms, legs, neck, head and whatnot. Parts is parts, ain’t like we’re all made of armor. Someone show’s you sumthin’, you just cut it off ‘toreckly, don’t need to speak no ching-chang-chong to do it.”

“Do you remember those two by the train tracks that night?”

“Yeah”

“You reckon they thought someone was watching them from the bushes? With a two-by-four? Or howzabout that girl behind the dumpster around back ‘o that Chinese buffet restaurant?”

“Of course I remember…I was there.”

“Uh-huh. And just what do y’suppose would have happened if they had been ARMED? Or even the slightest bit AWARE that they were in a bad place or surroundings? Or if they had seen you? You been caught before, right? Ain’t nobody perfect. Took the wind right outta yer sails didn’t it? Well?”

I had to admit, he was right.

‘And that’s how YOU learned. You saw what you did wrong & made the adjustment right then and there. You gotta admit boy, you stopped getting caught after a few nights in jail. Oh, they knew it was you, but you never landed behind bars again, now did you?”

“When you first came to C-Stop, you ‘member them times? All full of sass and smart-alecky. Them black boys was gonna kill you, no fuckin’ around. You learned how to hide because of the alternative. You learned how to stab because you couldn’t take them in a fistfight. And you learned to be sneaky because there was an alarm in the hallway. Knife fightin’ is a lot like that, you learn quick and adapt when you can because the alternative is a damn sight more motivational than anything else out there.”

“Well, I guess that makes sense, I just didn’t remember it that way.”

“Oh really, Mr. Hee-Row? That’s a right purty mouth you got there. ‘Specially the upper left lip.”

I looked away, my shoulders shrugged in defeat. He had me dead to rights, and he knew it.

“Oh yeah, I ‘member a few things m’self. You shoulda ran, boy. That’s all I can say. Could have saved you a week in a coma and months of gettin’ yo head screwed back on straight. But noooo, you had to go and stand in front of everything. Damn, how you didn’t end up in the Army as the official Bullet Interceptor is too far beyond my reckoning.”

“Just lucky, I guess” I replied.

“Huh. Lucky, you call it? You think you did it all on your own? You think you could have done without me to help you?”

“No, of course not. You saved me, I know that.”

“Then maybe you can answer ME something; Howcum that sassy boy is still young and fit, and me here sittin’ on Death’s door?”

We both knew the answer, but I voiced it anyway.

“He was the wolf I chose to feed”.

“Even though he wouldn’t even be BREATHIN’ it waren’t for me coming along and doing the hard work? I kept you alive! Remember the Blacks? That was me! You couldn’t have fought them and lived, sassy boy. I thought we were friends! Did I deserve this? LOOK AT ME!” He glared up at me with ancient eyes that had seen too much in far too short a time. For a second there, I honestly thought he was going to stand up and…Do Something. But he just sat back in his rocking chair and took another long pull from the mason jar. “You just set me aside and let me get old. Fucker.”

“I’m sorry, Samael. I’m just not you. That’s why I never come back to this place in my head to see you, I’ve always hated the aspect of me that WAS you. Yes, I’m alive because you existed, and yes, I would have died without you. But I was never meant to BE you, and if my parents would have lived, then you wouldn’t have existed at all. I only created you so the person I really am would have a chance later on in life. So you became everything that I’m not, nor ever could consciously be…A taker of life. A HATER of life. There was no other way to do it back then, but now…”

Sigh.

“I can do it on my own now, without killing. Without anger.”

“You tellin’ me you don’t get mad no more? You don’t wanna take some old boy’s head sometimes and smash it into red mush?” Sam was watching me really closely now.

“OF COURSE I get mad. Anger, love, hatred, passion…These emotions are mine, but I am not these emotions. Just like this scar on my lip you love reminding me about. I was standing up for something I believed in, and still do. This scar is like a badge of honor to me, and I have learned to live with it years ago. I wear the scar, it does not wear me.”

At this, a smile broke the old man’s face, looking as alien as a squid driving a car.

“Proud of you, boy”.