Outside in the fresh air it was a cold, dark and uninviting December early morning. I took a deep breath, exhaled, and wished for a smoke of which I had none. A pleasant, mild burning sensation from the beer warmed my guts. To my left a street light cut a conical form of light in the darkness emanating from the bulb at the top of the pole. A row of similar light forms stood as sentinels against the darkness down the road behind it off into the distance. Same thing in the opposite direction. The streets were empty. Not a soul could be seen. There was an eerie silence. I rolled up the collar on my jacket against the cold and started off at a leisurely pace to the right in the direction of the city center. Having been in the city for over a week I knew that along the way I would run into a derelict 18 wheeler truck cab abandoned in a small field where, being homeless, I planned to spend the night protected from the elements. It had a bolster and would keep me dry if it rained as it often did in Langley, a veritable five star Hilton to me compared to the places I had become accustomed to sleeping in and the concrete floors I had known.
As I ambled alone down the silent street the only sound was from my quiet humming of the melody of Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven having forgotten the words, while focusing inwards listening to the flow and ebb of the voices in my head quite oblivious to the world around me. Nothing stirred on the streets about me. About six blocks into my walk my attention was drawn outwards momentarily in an effort to navigate the crossing of the road at a brightly lit intersection at which I turned left.
I had just crossed the street when the silence was abruptly broken by the sound of a car engine suddenly accelerating. I looked up and speeding into the intersection from a head on direction to the direction in which I had been heading before I turned and crossed the street a police car exploded into view. The car accelerated through the intersection on a red light turning right in my direction into the oncoming traffic lane. It came to a screeching halt at the curb three feet away from me. Having been raised with the idea that a policeman is your friend I stood there on my spot on the grass beside the sidewalk wondering, “What the…?” It would appear I had unexpected company, company that appeared to be in a hell of a rush to say hello.
The driver’s side door burst open and one of the local boys in blue leapt forth. In the blink of an eye he was in my face with a threatening look of menace. Without warning he was upon me. Before I knew what was happening he wound up and hit me with a haymaker that glanced off my cheek only to follow up with another that landed square on my jaw. As I recoiled he let go with a solid punch to the gut. I doubled over and thus disabled he threw me to the ground. And all this with nary a hello or how-do-you-do. I mean, where are the niceties with people these days? We live in a civil society. I daresay his manners were somewhat lacking. I was appalled by his rudeness.
He stood over me and barked, “Stay down.”
As a man otherwise accustomed to a greater degree of courtesy, righteous indignation rose up inside of me. Animated by my indignation, and a little worse for the wear, I leapt up, looked him straight in the eyes, and exclaimed, “You can’t do that!”
Apparently, I was mistaken, or so he wished to argue. Taking up his side of the argument with a great deal of determination and violence he was at me again with a volley of punches and finished by throwing me to the ground a second time to convince me just how mistaken I was. While I must admit there was some persuasiveness to his argument, as a man of conviction and reason, I remained unconvinced still. (And for all his trouble I still found his manners somewhat lacking). Getting up, this time a little slower but mad as hell, I pressed my argument again, asserting “You can’t do that!”
Unfortunately, I was less persuasive than hoped. As a result, he was at me with more punches to the body, which I withstood this time. Seeing me still standing, he abruptly changed the premise of his argument by pulling back his right foot and snapping it forward kicking me in my groin. The point of his assertion landed off-center to the right of my junk, but the follow threw caught me in the bits and sent me off balance in agony. He finished off his line of reasoning by picking me up and throwing me to the ground on my back knocking the wind out of me, pinning me there with his knee in my chest. “Stay down,” he said with finality.
And, finally, I was persuaded. So persuaded I remained on the ground to catch my breath and resist the urge to vomit from the pain in my genitals. So preoccupied no counter argument came immediately to mind, but as I lay there in agony upon my back I made a mental note to take the officer off my list as a potential best man for my future wedding, the prospects of which were questionable. My prospects were questionable because I had yet to find a woman that lived up to my high standard, that standard being that she had to like me. I find that attractive in a female. And, so, for the moment, the battle was lost, but the war was yet to be fought. This was not over.