Here is a brief tale as told by my twenty-six year old son. It happened recently in the heart of an American municipality where male siblings are quite fond of one another:
This story requires that I use an alias, as there may be some touchy legal issues. So I’ll call myself Zevin Zitchell. I live and work in downtown Zilladelphia. I work close enough to home that I often just walk. This afternoon I was walking home from work, on a sidewalk, along a one way street. Even though the street is one way, there’s room left to park along the curb and still allow traffic to flow. It snowed yesterday in Phi….sorry, Zilly and there was about three inches still on the ground. The temperature was in the thirties. I wore a waterproof hoodie, shorts, and tennis shoes, and carried a backpack. Because it was now sprinkling a bit, the icy sidewalks were extremely slick. The city had salted the streets so I decided to walk off the sidewalk, kind of on the edge of the street so I wouldn’t slip and fall.
So I was walking along minding my own business a couple of blocks from home. Suddenly I felt a thump on my back, and I immediately recognized the projectile as a snowball. I quickly turned around and saw an approaching SUV, a dark blue something, I’m not sure the make. I was on the left side of the road so the SUV was passing me on my right. A youngish white guy – I presume the snowball thrower - was hanging out the rear driver’s side window. As the SUV passed, the guy yelled at me, “Hey, dumbass, why don’t you put on some pants, it’s cold outside!” The SUV drove on.
I almost never wear long pants. Even if it’s freezing outside, I’m usually fine as long as I wear a jacket and cover my head. As long as I’m not outdoors for hours or something. So shorts and a jacket is the uniform of the day. Besides, eff him, it’s none of his beeswax what I wear.
Furthermore, I’ve been in a number of snowball fights where friends hurl consensual snowballs at each other. I realize it can be quite fun and generally doesn’t hurt. In fact, in this case it didn’t hurt either; as I was wearing a fairly substantial waterproof hoodie and only felt a mild thunk. But that’s not the point. I’ll admit firstly that I had just finished a pretty tough day at work and my mood was a bit….hmm…..let me see….cranky. And besides, this was not a fun game of snowball toss among friends. It was a nasty, malicious prank directed at a complete stranger, who was just walking home from work, minding his own business, on a cold, rainy day. So I was pissed. Of course they had driven away so there was nothing I could do about it anyway. Still, I thought, those bastards, I wish I could beat their ass or something. “Whatever,” I thought.
Just then I noticed brake lights as the SUV become stuck in traffic at a stop light a block ahead. It was as if God had flung the traffic control switches and spoke directly to me: “Zevin,” God declared, “you must do what is commanded!” I seized my opportunity.
I sprinted toward the SUV as it sat waiting for the green. As I approached from the driver’s rear side, I noticed that all the windows were now rolled up. Tinted windows, as I recall. Everything was rolling so fast I wasn’t really sure what I would do if I was indeed lucky enough to reach the SUV before it was able to pull away. It turns out I caught up in plenty of time. I realized that I must formulate a plan in a flash. I thought to myself, “kick a dent into the car? Punch the guy?” Punching the guy was out of the question since the windows were up and I actually couldn’t see inside. Then, through what must have been divine guidance, it all became automatic. I cocked back my right arm and elbowed the driver’s side rear window as hard as I could. The window shattered into a billion little pieces and showered the interior of the SUV. I saw the guy in the back seat as he cowered away from my side and noticed another dude in the front passenger seat with eyes like golf balls. I never saw the driver. Somebody yelled, “Holy shit! What the fuck, dude!! Holy Shit!!” The guy in the back seat finally turned his head to see what was happening. So I said, “Hey dumb ass, why don’t you fix your window. It’s broken.”
Then I turned and walked away in the direction I came from. I figured they couldn’t follow me or run me over, since it was a one-way street. I continued to the next block, turned right, and walked around the block to get home. I never saw the SUV again.
The whole thing was surreal. I’m pretty sure the other guy did a (minor) crime in heaving a snowball at me. I’m not sure the legality of my reaction. I also don’t think I care. My crankiness had subsided. I had a much better day after that.
