Wally
Wally was a bastard. I’m sorry, but this guy was not a teen…he had been held back so many times, I think he would get a PhD in 10th grade education. He would sell drugs to other high school kids, before class.
He knew I didn’t like him. He noticed that the first day of school when he said something to me and I turned away in disgust. He targeted me in retaliation. He was the permanent fixture and a bully.
At this point I was a seasoned fighter. I had a number of all-out fights, and did not have a single speck of fear in me. I did not plan to fight this monster, but I remember making a mental note to keep an eye out for him.
I did not have any reputation. My family had just moved to midtown Manhattan and I had greatly enjoyed the summer of 1976. Disco music was in the air…people would dance anywhere at any time. I loved the party atmosphere. Kids would bring their boomboxes to school and played them in the cafeteria, outside, even in the subways.
I had a future relative of mine bring his boombox to school one morning….as he walked towards us, we could hear this boom, boom BOOM! getting closer. So we started calling him “boom-boom” after that day….. Wally ran up to boom-boom and slapped the box off his arms and smashed it. They got into a fight, Boom-boom lost. I think it was because everytime Wally got into a conflict, his “crew” would pop up immediately, to referee the fight, and instigate and even play dirty.
Boom-boom tried to fight him after school, but again, lost.
Wally generally stayed away from me, which was a good thing, because this was high school and I did not want to attain any reputation. I was going out with Boom-Boom’s sibling and I was having a great time. I made it past to 11th grade then Wally had enough of me and my small degree of success as I was in, with the cool crowd.
Wally started making comments, and everytime I boarded the subway home, he would always start teasing me about one thing or another. I would ignore him.
Of course this escalated. He started with criticism, and then he said it: “ I should beat you down”….. what do you say to something like that? –go on ahead.
One day, I was in history class….the classroom often doubled as an art class with wide desks and all. During one of these classes he turned around and just out of nowhere….he spat on my face.
I had a problem with this. I don’t think I wanted to arrange any bouts nor I wanted my anger to give way to logic. I grabbed the back of his collar, and his body flew in an overhead arc, and landed in the floor behind me. I dispatched him promptly by a barrage of punched and kicks until he cried uncle----which sent his credibility as a tough guy, down the drain from that point on.
The building we attended for school was 6 flights tall a huge one…lots of stairs. I met Wally in one of them one, and he was hell bent on revenge. He was above me, about 5 feet up the stairs….he took a leap to try to knock me down. He missed. He ended up in the hospital.
I made a point to really stay away….now he escalated his treat to wanting to kill me. I was a thorn on his side and he needed to regain his reputation. He started following me.
My dad went to the dojo one day to pick me up to take me to dinner, as my mom had taken my siblings to my aunts house for a visit. So here I was, in my Gi, and Wally shows up. He starts taunting me. My father sees this, and asks him if he has all his marbles in him. He had this story about having to defend his statute in the community, and he can’t let it go until he takes care of me.
My father said, “Son, I can’t let you die like this”, and told him to go pick on someone bigger than him. People are strange sometimes. During dinner, I told dad about Wally and his problem. He went on to tell me that this often happens when people cannot deal with defeat, and I should have never used violence to take care of him. After the threat in front of my father, my dad had to ask me if I feared for my safety. I responded that I was only annoyed that Wally would not go away.
He went and had a chat with the school principal, then had a meeting with his parents, who I found out were very unsavory characters….
My friends and I decided to make an after school trip to central park to hang out and enjoy the day….then Wally showed up. I asked my friends not to follow us, and I invited Wally to step into a more secluded area.
By this time, I had been past the kiddie karate phase; I was training with the adults, and had my 1st degree in Shotokan. I was pretty full of myself. It took me about 15 minutes to physically convince Wally that I was not the droid he was looking for. I went back to my friends with a chest full of pride and we went back to our day out.
Wally was more determined than I was. What he lacked in common sense, he more than made up in stupidity. And the more he kept coming back, the more I was convinced that he really meant to kill me. One day, the knife came out.
I had experience the big 007 switchblade once before. That story did not end well for my opponent. Wally was headed into a road well-traveled. I decided to listen to my father and tried to defuse the situation with a sincere talk. Wally was not about talking. He needed desperately to make me the loser, at all cost and he didn’t mind killing me for it. So he went ahead and took a few swings trying to slash me.
When Wally tried this latest attack, I was on my way home, just down the street; I always met a challenge like that, away from people. People always made a ruckus and they always interfered to the point of making a situation, worse. We found one of the many lots available, and went into this. I started talking as we danced around parrying. He was very unhappy and was getting worse. He kept telling me to shut up. He would lunge at me when I mocked him. (This became part of my fighting style, ever since).
He became impatient, sloppy and he kept getting hit, time and time again. I told him to give it up. He wouldn’t. He kept at it, even though he kept falling, I would trip him as he lunged his attacks and then he ran out of steam. I decided to attack…
I felt bad for him. But wait; he meant not only to kill me, but he was abusive and I now feared he would run behind me and kill me in a moment least expected. I decided to punish him. I continued talking during my attacks. I told him I would stop only after he swore to me that he would on tape; swear that he would never mess with me. I told him, I would be back, with my cassette player, so he could record it on tape. If he refused, I promised him, I would humiliate him in front of everyone.
I’m not sure, but I think I still have that cassette. I played it to my family until they got tired of my bragging. …
One day, I was walking down the street with my son. I was on leave from the service, and we decided to walk down the old neighborhoods. As we walked, my Son asked me to tell him stories of when I was growing up. I was almost finished telling him my story of Wally, all of the sudden a voice from behind---vaguely familiar called my name. I turned around, and there he was.
I almost cried when I saw him. Not from fear, but he was…. a crack head. He used to have the most brilliant green eyes that seemed to glow; now they were barely there. I looked at my son, and I said, “And this is Wally”.