“Tell a story of how you were able to heal a wound or two by making fun of someone who wounded you.”
RENEGADES WE WERE
How about some comeuppance?
As an upstanding and talented juvenile delinquent, I and my compatriots performed some fairly amazing pranks as kids, but they didn’t always end well. One consequence I will never forget had a very painful ending for me, the sting of which I can almost still feel as I write this.
As seasoned pranksters, we were usually able to wreak innocent havoc with little or no consequence. We considered most of these actions laughable, while our victims of course, considered them malicious. Every now and then our victims set out to “teach these malicious punks a lesson”.
A newspaper delivery station was a fertile ground for young minds to breed trouble. It happened to be located in a fine neighborhood, near one of Denver’s famous scenic Parkways, 17th Ave. We kids all spent a lot of time there, either up to no good already, or planning just how we would be soon. Snowstorms met snowballs, first at each other and then when that grew old, at passing cars.
We had a perfect spot at an H alley where we could inflict a surprise attack on unsuspecting passing motorists, laughing all the while. Although many of these wounded drivers rightly wanted to retaliate, our positioning in an alley just before a busy intersection on a one way street rendered them powerless to do so. We were essentially at a spot where we could not be caught. Before they even knew what had happened to them, the bombarded and by now very angry victim had already gone past an intersection on a one way street with no way to turn around and do anything about it.
So, over time, hundreds of vehicles were bombarded by our malicious crew of motley renegades, without any retribution or consequence. We continued to surprise, scare, and incur the deserved wrath of innocent morotirsts without so much as a slap on the wrist…
UNTIL……….
A group of motorists who had no doubt previously witnessed our escapades in helpless disdain on multiple occasions, and had probably been the recipients of multiple surprise bombardments decided to teach these punks a lesson. What’s the first rule of a gang fight? Don’t go by yourself. Particularly when your adversaries not only outnumber you, they are twice your size.
In retrospect, I am not sure how my buddy and I let our guard down, lost track of time, grew comfortable, smoked too much weed, etc., etc. but before we realized it, somehow the two of us were surrounded by six (6) full grown adults who snuck up in the alley behind us. As soon as we saw them, we both knew that our comeuppance had arrived. When I think about it now, I am not sure which is worse, knowing you are going to get pummeled by five snowballs in the face while being held powerless by a large man twice your size or watching it happen to your friend first and knowing you are next.
Suffice it to say I watched my friend as he screamed, and burst into tears. I was next I screamed but did not cry, but it hurt so bad I can feel it to this day. And for 50+ years I have never thrown another snowball at anything but a tree. Message received and fully understood.
under1000skies 