When I Think of Courage

He was the kid that everyone picked on in grade school.  He dressed funny, had shaggy hair, was socially awkward, and his smell was a weaponized friend repellant.  He tried to make fun of the way I walked once, and then I teased him till he cried.

It happened during recces in fifth grade.  A group of us were playing four-square and when I ran to get a stray ball the damage in my knees was made manifest through my gait.  In a moment I’m sure he intended to use as a way to pull his own social status from the gutter, he pointed at me, laughed, and made an attempt in humor at my expense.

But no one laughed.  Even if it had been funny none of the other kids would have laughed because snickering at his joke would have lessened their own popularity.  Yet I still felt enraged; infused with anger at the conceit with which a socially inferior child had made fun of my own obvious disabilities. So I fired back, and I kept firing my seething insults until the poor child retreated in humiliation and in tears.

The others on the playground praised my refutes with approving smiles.  With the innocence of childhood they laughed at my demeaning jokes concerning the boy's personal appearance and egged me on through my harsher criticisms of his family’s poor economic circumstances.  When my tirade of eloquent lies and half-truths concerning his shortcomings had ended I felt appeased.

I felt accomplished in the evil I had done by bullying a child, but now I don’t see why.  Now I see an episode of disgrace when my courage failed me.  I see an instance when I could have included instead of discounted; when I could have uplifted, not corrupted.

That boy and his family moved the following year and by the time I realized my cowardice concerning him it was too late to repair the damage done.  My absence of courage in this thing has haunted me since.

In this instance my courage failed me, or I failed it.  Since then and even before, a deep fascination revolving around courage and its meaning developed within me.  Many of my pondering thoughts of quiet meditation through the years have been occupied with this notion of what makes courage courage and what motivates people into courageous acts.

My well-articulated lies and disparaging observations of another boy in my grade school class reflected cowardice, not courage. But other examples from humanity show that there is true courage among people.  Courage of the quality to do what is right even at the expense of their very lives.

Like the courage of a friend of mine in later life who chose to succumb to the painful distresses of cancer for nine months so as to grant life to her yet unborn child.  She held her newborn once, and then passed away. 

Or the courage of a posthumously awarded Medal of Honor recipient in Afghanistan who chose to charge the enemy by himself so that his Special Forces team members could safely retreat from the ambush they had stumbled into.  This action caused every enemy weapon on the battlefield to be directed at him.  At the cost of his life he saved his unit. 

So what causes a mother to give her life for her child or a soldier to sacrifice mortality for his friends?  And will an honest answer to that question provide the answer to what drives real courage?  Philosophy is not my strong point, but I believe there is a fundamental difference between bravery and courage and that that core variance is love.  A brave act can arise from a multitude of motivations, but the courage to uplift, protect, enrich, and defend must all stem first from love.

Les Petit Miserables

The fourth grade classroom rested in tranquil silence, each student but one reading from their favorite book or short story.  I sat stone-faced and defiant at my desk; my little four foot two inch frame shaking from pride, fear, and a concrete conviction.  “Carver, why aren’t you doing your reading?  It’s reading time.”

Miss Kraft’s voice, I always thought, sounded like a repressive dictator’s howl.  Low in tone for a woman, and blubberish, her voice matched her despotic personality and appearance.  Hers was a voice of cruel injustice, demanding far more from her students than I thought prudent.  Assigning homework every day?  What gall and arrogance.  It was more than my fourth grade soul could bear.  And the others were with me, but lacked the courage to resist, to revolt, to rebel.

“Carver?”  Miss Kraft asked again.

A hot fusion of blood rushed to my head, blushed my checks with courage, and with my eyes closed I silently mimicked Kevin from Home Alone, “This is it, don’t get scared now.”

“I’m not reading, Miss Kraft.” I said with my eyes still closed and head bowed. 

A hushed gasp raced through the ranks of my classmates.  I could feel their eyes nervously shifting from me to Miss Kraft and back to me again.  Slowly, deliberately, I started to speak.

“You tell us every day to read and I’ve had enough. I am an agent of my own choice and action.  So today I choose to no longer follow your tyrannical laws of education, but instead to make my own path to freedom!“  Energy surged through me.  Turning in my chair I met Miss Kraft’s burning glares with stiff resolve.  I found myself slowing rising from my chair, fists clasp in haughty disobedience, voice shaking but ever increasing in volume and force.

“Send me to the corner, to detention, to the principal’s office itself, but I am not reading today!  Too long you have reigned over us in prejudice and inequality.  Too long has your despotic arm stretched its stinging shadow of pain and homework over our nights and weekends.  And too long has your undisputed power been left unchecked to ravage and pillage our childhoods!” 

I was no longer shaking.  The fear had dispelled and I spoke clearly while anger wisped from my lips. “Well I say no more!  I say no more reading, no more history, no more science, and for mercy’s sake, sweet heavens above, no more math!”

I was on top of my desk now, all eyes fixed upon me in awe.  Out of breath, chest panting, I scanned the room and saw glimpses of hope and courage in the eyes of my classmates.  Now was the time if ever there would be one.  I gathered what remained of my resilience, looked at Comrade Frau Kraft sitting behind her imperial desk, and boldly shouted to those in my periphery, “Who’s with me!?”

The children were now rising too from their seats.  First to his feet was Ben, my ever faithful colleague and my brother in arms.  Then Alice, my sweetheart to the end, stood beside her desk.  All arose; all threw down their texts of lies, their images of discrimination and deceit, and joined together in united opposition against the secret society of repressive grade school education.

“Carver?  I said, why aren’t you reading?”

Miss Kraft’s voice shook me from my day dream.  Her repeated question slowed Alice and Ben from their flirting just long enough to glance my way before continuing their disgusting display of juvenile romancing.  “I am reading, Miss Kraft, I promise.”  I opened a random book and hung my head in submissive defeat.  Maybe tomorrow I’d find the courage.  Maybe tomorrow I’d find my words.

Authors note:  While the rebellion of fourth grade is a true story, and while I did sponsor many reading-time silent protest as well as outspoken delinquent dissertations, I thought it prudent to change the name of the overly strict teacher.  Oh, and Ben and Alice are completely made up.

Four Idiots vs. One Buffalo

Later, Kenny recounted that he thought since the buffalo had been so docile up to this point, and because Schwab and I were so close to the animal without the tension of danger, that he could take a chance and maybe get close enough to touch it.  Why boys must touch, scratch, sniff, feel, taste, and listen to the most random of items, we, collectively as a gender, couldn't say; but the acute tantalization of curiosity prods us onward into paths of both glory and ruin.  And so it was in this case.  The moments that followed brought with them a crescendo of gallant humiliation only to be understood as the victory of survival. 

It started with a trip to South Dakota.  Admittedly a random vacation destination for four college kids, but we piled into Kenny’s Toyota Corolla anyway and told Provo to kiss it as we drove out of town.  Ten hours or so later we surveyed the sleepy town of Custer, South Dakota, the gateway to Mount Rushmore.  Tourist season was only a week away, but the town was still in its winter-long hibernation.  Shops and resorts lay dormant.  Even the campground we stayed at deployed gates that blocked all but one campsite.  With nothing to do and four days to do it, we decided that after a stop by The Faces we’d see what else was around.  It was then, during this period of aimless wondering through scenic Needle’s Highway, that we were brought face to face with the titan of the prairie. 

I don’t remember who said what or even direct quotations, as is typical due to the random and scattered banter that makes up our usual dialog.  But as we were winding through a forested area and passing an empty lodge, something similar to the following conversation took place with all four of us participating at different parts.

  

“Hey look!  A buffalo!” 

“No it wasn’t, that was just a statue.”

“Some say I have the jaw line of a statue.” 

“Statues don’t move, idiot.  Turn around.”

“Others say you’re just dumb, so . . .”

“You and I both know that statues can move.” 

“That is a buffalo!  Two of ‘em!  There's a second behind that trailer.”

“Wait, when was the last time you saw a statue move?  And dreams don’t count.”

“Flip around.  Drive in there and let’s have a look.”

“Jell-O statues move. They wiggle like this—blublublublub.”

“And when there is an earthquake.  Statues be straight dancin’ in an earthquake.  Boom!”

“Did you really just punctuate an Ebonics-esk statement with ‘boom’?”  

“Stop right here so we can look at ‘em.”

“I’m getting out of the car.”

“Yeah, me too!”

The four of us piled out of the car with giddiness and positioned ourselves cautiously closer to the animals, each taking one step closer than the next until we had leapfrogged ourselves to within ten yards of the nearest bison.  It was at this point that Kenny’s ambition of curiosity almost got us killed.  

Kenny whistled as he started his approach, arms innocently clasped behind his back, head and eyes dodging nonchalantly from one cloud to the next; but ever closing, ever gaining ground to count coup on the beast who grazed inattentively some ten yards away.  Kenny passed me then Schwab and continued. 

From five yards or closer the world exploded.  A red and brown eye the size of a baseball rolled from its focus on the edible grass up and to the side to fix on the approaching idiot.  Now, I don’t speak buffalo, but I’m assuming that the grunt that followed the eye movement was a communication to his buffalo buddy close by that said something to the effect of "Hey Earl, check this out."  Earl never took his eyes off his meal of green grass but did casually reply "Bet you can’t gore him before he pees his pants." 

A monstrous head turned to its side and down, flashing obsidian horns.  Black hoofs dug into the soil and launched forward causing the first few inches of earth to give way and slingshot back into a chunky puff of debris.  Reckoning.  In the form of a thousand pound bulldozer of muscle and sinew it was nothing less than our reckoning.  Death on four thunderous legs.  But Kenny could talk.  Nothing much, just a hurried “oh crap!” as he scrambled away from the charging beast, but at least he could do it.  Schwab and I couldn’t.

The scene inside my brain, my command center, my computing and analytics department must have reflected an office building in fear-driven revolt.  Clerical workers in terror screaming and jumping up and down, executives trying to find windows to jump out of, and brain interns punching themselves in the face.   Binders full of mental notes were thrown in the air scattering their contents with random piles of paper being burned.

When the buffalo first twitched, when his eyes first shifted from food to pest, my vocal cords retreated with my mentalities into a dark cavernous room inside my head labeled "flight" where they huddled in fear.  This actually helped me maintain a certain level of dignity, otherwise I would have been flapping my hands in front of me screaming unintelligible whaling’s in falsetto.  Luckily something was left to control my legs so after jumping straight up into the air, twisting one hundred and eighty degrees and running five steps above ground I touched down again and ran for the far side of the car; intending to use it, if necessary, as a bull fighter would use a barrel.  Because that’s all the Toyota Corolla would have been to the buffalo, nothing more than a barrel to be tossed and tattered.    

Kenny was closest to the furry tractor now bearing down on him.  I’ve never been present when the Spaniards let loose the bulls in Pamplona, but I have seen many videos of terrified macho men with looks of pure panic and fear on their faces running with their heads back and chests out.  Kenny looked much like that.

 

By his own admission when the buffalo charged Schwab’s sphincter puckered to the point of retraction and ended up in his stomach, the resulting pressure transforming his inny to an outty.  Running with hips rotated out and knees extending laterally to his sides like a man pelted in the behind, Schwab scrambled twenty yards and up some stairs to the perceived safety of a wooden porch. 

Meanwhile, Lathen, who had returned to the car, sat wide eyed and gaped mouth in the passenger side of the Corolla.  While on-lookers may see this as safe position, it is anything but a refuge.  If the wild beast wanted to he could have easily flipped, smashed, and rolled the tiny Corolla like a kitten playing with a ball of yarn.

After only a few steps the beast stopped, snorted his dominance over four panicking fools, and returned to munching on blades of green grass.  With a wary eye on the stabilized bison, we all made our way back to the car with the hysterical giggles that seemingly always follow a narrow escape.  In true male form, we shouted taunts to the winner of our little contest of supremacy as we sped from the lodge area and back to the main road.              

Toddlers are Harsh

About a year ago I was sitting with two of my young nephews, aged three and five, watching TV after dinner.  Well, I was sitting anyway.  They were crawling up and down and around and through with the normal incessant energy of small boys. 

The large chair I was sitting on, and myself, of course, made up the jungle gym that the boys were using to expel some of that youthful energy.   The oldest had fallen (I may have playfully pushed him) from my knee and the younger one was high-centered on the chair’s headrest above me when a TV spot came on advertising a hair restoration clinic.

Pictures of prematurely balding men with depressed faces filed across the screen.  The boys halted in their irregular positions and watched the commercial for a second.  From the ground in front of me the older boy giggled.

“You kinda have that.” He said as he turned to look up at me.

I felt a tiny finger poke my bald spot followed by a small three-year-old voice from above my head.

“Yeah, wight therw.”

Dad-gum kids. Dad-gum painfully honest kids. 

At a wake for my hairline where the rootbeer flowed freely

"To the fallen!"

One of Life’s Little Mile Markers

The mile markers on a highway in Idaho are often used to designate a person’s location.  They provide a structure among the otherwise chaotic movements of mountains, valleys, and rivers that make up Idaho land.  Often, mile markers are used to mentally mark fishing holes along the river, the turnoffs to campgrounds, placements of various trailheads, and other like locations.

As with an Idaho highway, life itself offers little mile markers.  These mile markers can be used by a person to judge their own progression as they negotiate the winding curves and changing courses of life.  The first tooth for a baby, the first home for a couple, the first child for a parent, and so on.  I experienced one of these mile markers of life rather unexpectedly a few years ago. 

It happened when I stopped by a local beauty shop to get my haircut after class.  The hair dresser was kind, as most people who work for tips are, and we made pleasant conversation while she worked.  This mile marker of life, this signal that I had passed into a new phase of development and maturity, happened while getting my sideburns trimmed. 

After the typical scrape down the cheek and light but precise trim next to the ear, the buzz of the clippers stalled and innocently hovered over my right lobe.  With two quick strikes the stylist attacked.  In panic at being stripped of its furry coverings my right ear lobe shriveled behind itself and took shelter from the toothy monster that had accosted it. With a face of violation, shock, and honest confusion at what had just happened, I looked helplessly up at the politely smiling stylist. 

No words were spoken.  She knew I knew, and I knew I knew, that ear hair trimming was now an official part of my haircut; making my lobes fair game to all who specialize in the cutting of human hair.  I sat sad and deflated through the rest of my haircut.  I didn’t even flinch when the same treatment was given to the left lobe.  I was utterly and completely defeated.  And do you know the worst part?  I realized then that I was one step closer another of life’s little mile markers - multi-colored eyebrows.

Stupid Sound of Music

A couple years back I took a Far East history class (turned out to be harder than I thought because every time our teacher pronounced a Chinese name I’d have to stifle a giggle-Liu Bang, hehe). After class we’d sit down in groups and write out a paper on what was learned that day, what we thought of the material, the definition of each new vocab word, etc.

One day we learned about a Chinese political philosophy called legalism. There are three principles that form the base of the philosophy which are called Fa, Shu, and Shi. The group remembered the premise of Shu and struggled through the meaning of Shi.  When we got around to explaining Fa, a group member said "what was Fa again?"

And I said, "I think it's a note to follow So. Wait no, no it's a long long way to run. Yep. Fa, a long long way to run."

Blank stares and crickets emanated from my group.  I guess that’s what happens when a guy grows up with three older sisters.  He gets easily infatuated with puzzles and derives his humor from musicals.