I'm Jack's Total Lack of Courage
Monday, Feb. 14, 2005, 4:10 p.m.

Editor's Note: This is an old boring entry that I wrote that I never posted. I wasn't going to bother, but if I died on Thursday, I wouldn't be writing anymore (see also: rotting corpse) so I figured I might as well give you bitches something to hold on to.

Look, I loved Fight Club as much as the next disgruntled, chasin-the-Amerikan-dream, materialistic slacker. In fact, I'm not ashamed to admit that I *heart with arrow through it* LUVED that movie. That may be due in small part to Brad Pitt being barechested throughout, but I like to think it had more to do with the rage-against-the-machine, I-never-asked-The-Man-for-nuthin mentality that spoke to me at the time. What did NOT appeal to me, however, was the basic premise: people beating the ever-lovin' snot out of each other for shits and giggles. See, I just don't get fighting. Esplain it to me.

Maybe sometime I understood it. Back in fourth grade I certainly might have. After the summer we spent in the bottom of her unfinished swimming pool doing seances and the "light as a feather, stiff as a board" routine, Angie Rizzuto and I decided, quite suddenly, in the Fall of fourth grade, to become ENEMIES. Not just ENEMIES, mind you, but fist-fightin' ENEMIES. I don't know how or why it happened, but we arranged, quite civilly in fact, to have a fight. After we got off the bus (she lived across the street diagonally from me), we'd go change our clothes and then meet on the neutral ground of our neighbor's lawn--where we proceeded to bash each other's skulls in. Everyday. Every. Day. There were rules, of course, that we had established:

1. no hair pulling
2. no scratching
3. no pinching
4. no biting
5. no ear pulling (Angie had an obscene fear of having her ears ripped off)

But other than that? It's was a goddamn free-for-all. If anyone broke the rules, the fighting would immediately stop, and there might have been some dim notion of what constituted "winning", but I don't remember that part. What I do remember, though, was my fist in her gut, her giving me a forearm-shiver to the face, a flurry of slaps in response, and her tackling me with rabbit punches again and again to the arms. That was the first day. We had a little neighborhood crowd that day, and some more the many days after, but eventually people lost interest, and it got too cold to be wrassling each other on dead grass. And as suddenly and inexplicably as it began, it ended.

But though I don't understand it and never have, I have a distinct memory of enjoying it. What's that about? How do you explain it? It's like running--when was the last time you just ran and ran and ran and ran like you did as a kid?--I totally forget what it felt like and why I would have wanted to do it. Post-fourth grade I have never punched anyone with the intent to harm them, and despite the oft-declared "I'd love to beat his/her/their face in," I don't think that I'd actually love it, you know? There was that time in high school with my boyfriend when I was re-enacting The Bells of St. Mary's--you know the part where the nun is teaching the kid to box? Yeah, and I accidently broke my boyfriend's nose? I remember that I didn't love that. And then I went through that whole headbutting my friends stage? And then the slapping/being slapped preposterously hard across the face? Oh wait. No. Scratch those last two off the list, because I did, in fact, love those. But that had more to do with being gah-bombed and finding it Highly Amusing than having to do with the enjoyment of inflicting and receiving of pain. Because, aside from fourth grade which I can't rilly remember, THAT'S the part that I don't get.

Matt sometimes enjoys The Boxing and his latest interest is in "Ultimate Fighting Championship Wannabe" or something or rother (some reality program about making the next UFC fighter--because we don't watch ENOUGH reality programs as it is) and it's beyond beyond. I honestly have a hard time watching it. Please take a moment to grasp Television being hard for me to watch. That comes as naturally to me as double-fisting bags of potato chips. But the idea of UFC is to get two guys in a cage *You know I'm training to be a cage fighter* and then they can kick, punch, chop, slap, choke, wrestle each other into submission. UFC prides itself on "recreating the most violent legitimate martial arts contest in the world." It's brutal. It's like a video game? Only with real people. And like boxers, these guys get their faces smashed in and their bodies pummeled, but they also will ocassionally get their bones snapped or be choked unto unconsciousness if they didn't "tap out" in time. So, anyway, that's UFC and the show is about finding the next champion. And last night on the show, one guy is forced to lose 20 pounds in 24 hours to make weight in order to fight. Basically by living in a sauna and sweating out all the water in his body. And one of his teammates says "If he doesn't do this, he will regret it for the rest of his life. He'll realize he doesn't have the mind of a UFC champion." So, question #1: he will regret WHAT? No comprendo. Question #2: what IS the mind of a UFC champion? What does it take to want to beat someone else? The desire to inflict pain was described as "waking up on Christmas Day." Where you bitches celebrating Christmas--Rwanda? The point is, I just don't understand this blood-thirst. Maybe I'm too much of a puss-puss, or my threshold of pain is low, or I ain't got no chops, but shee-it, people, WHY? I've been giving it much thought and I think I've narrowed it down to two possible explanations: lack of brain size or lack of penis size. There MUST be a direct correlation between these and the desire to fight bloody fights for no good reason. See, if I could just get an accurate picture of our President's genitalia, I could clear this up once and for all. Because I really want to understand.

Which brings me back to the Number 5. For my surgery, the whole fan damily has decided to come wish me well in the afterlife. That is to say, my Mom and Pop. And my brother. And my Dad. And in case you were wondering, all four of them have not been in the same room since my wedding day over ten years ago. Meep! I'm pretty sure The Ultimate Fight Champion will be awarded on this day, as the blood is, howdoyousay? Bad? Yes, Bad. You'd think after 30 some years, people would give it a rest already? Riiiiight--Hello Unresolved Issues. So I'm totally panicking about this reunion, because basical, I don't want to have to deal with the Sweet-Lawd-I-wish-I-could-make-you-bleed mentality that will be reflective of the just-beneath-the-surface-blinding-rage-and-hatred that'll be boiling. But Hark! Ima make this stupendously clear: despite all my pacifistic tendencies, if peeps try to get rowdy with each other, they will be faced with a HURRICANE of beatings, the likes of which have not been seen since fourth grade. Ohh ho ho, they'll be wishing they could "tap out" once my mighty wrath has begun, but I. Will. Keep. No. Prisoners. They shall all perish in my Smackdown 2005. Oh yes. They will. So everybody on the same page with this? Yes? Good. Because for truth, I'm a coward and I'm really shitting my pants over this.

Why can't we all just get a bong?