Taken to the woodshed:
Today this phrase can mean many things:
*A spanking
*A big loss in a sporting event
*Out maneuvered in business
*Big loss in Vegas or on Wall Street
*Getting ripped off in general
etc......
But
Back in the day, being taken to the woodshed was an invite to experience pain, physical and mental pain. The invite meant you had to think about it, and I do not know if you could have rejected the invite. It would seem to be a very personal decision and by all accounts, the invitee was probability bigger than the invited.
This had me thinking........in the city, we had no woodsheds. I see many woodsheds here, down south.
I would have avoided the woodshed at all costs. The visions I have of this place are not good ones………..,
.......bad things happen in woodsheds. Being threatened to be taken to a woodshed, would be cause enough for me to schedule another appointment somewhere else for that same time period. I am not a wimp by no means, I had my share of “street fights” up north, but they were sort of impromptu affairs, and we were never “invited” to a specific place.
I don’t anticipate well,
Take my job for example; if I know a day ahead of time that I am going to speak to a room full of people but am last on the list of speakers, I go through hell, pure hell, thinking about all the things that WILL go wrong with my speech. I feel out of control, my hands get all sweaty and I am confident about one thing only,that I will say something completely stupid.......
.......and when standing in front of everybody, the fear of my zipper being down comes over me. How do I initiate a zipper check in front of all of these people? This is my internal woodshed. The speech goes OK, but I am exhausted with all the worrying.
Now, ask me to speak to this same group in an impromptu manner and I am Mr. Flamboyant........
.......and hit a home run with the speech, beaming at the end "awe, it was nothing" No thinking involved, no pre-speech jitters.
I am not a fighter
I am really not a fighter, but in the city I had to learn to at least expect a confrontation at some point growing up. Everybody got involved in some scrape or another,it was only a matter of time before the fight gods would shine the fight light on you.
I’ll fight you with one shoe off!
I consider my first ever “fight” a success. It was after Jr. High School, 3:15pmish, Wade Lamier called my shoes “Jesus kickers” (because my mom bought them at the Salvation Army) Now, I have nothing against our Savior, but was thinking my honor and my Mothers honor was somehow breached. So I pushed him, a crowd gathered he swung at me, I ducked and was getting ready to swing back, but as I was maneuvering to get the best shot, one of my shoes fell off!
Well,that led to loud laughter by all of the spectators and even my opponent. At the same time this was going on, the crossing guard (they were real police back then) came over and broke us up. I would have “creamed” him I would tell my friends later. No woodshed, out in the open and for all to see.
How you made it through city life unscathed was all about your “standing” in the neighborhood. This standing was directly related to your size and or what you did to make other kids notice you. It was a lot of perception and fake bravado as well; kids would “puff up” when threatened…
Most kids avoided a fight, but just like the puffer fish above, would display verbally, or physically their best attributes in war, then when really threatened and in imminent danger ------- they would run or stay and get their ass beat.
There were also some neighborhood kids who talked the talk and punched the punch.
My friend Raymond was known as a puncher! If you pissed him off, he would walk over to you softly and without warning lean back and let you have it square on the nose – no woodshed invite here. I wanted to be Raymond’s best friend, and I was, although we had a Rocky (no pun intended) start.
It was a very hot day in Dorchester, a city on the outskirts of Boston, I was 14 at the time, I remember playing with a water hose.....
......and Raymond walked over to say something, so I sprayed him, not just a light spray but a soaking wet spray. If it was just the two of us he probably would have laughed it off, but because there were friends around who were laughing, Raymond took action. No Woodshed invite, but he came and walked over to me and with the precision of a cruise missile, and the force of a jackhammer, punched me directly on the nose.
It was over with one punch, no use in puffing up to Raymond, he was big and fearless. I have never been hit like that before or since. Blood everywhere, the pain and message was sent. I respect a dry Raymond. We were the best of friends after that, we both had respect for each other and I think he felt sorry for belting me.
I palled around with the big boppers, told jokes etc..I was protected, after all, as a kid I was a skinny, 150 pounder. An inner city neighborhood could be very mean and if you were not liked, your life was miserable! My mission was to blend in, not a leader or a follower, sort of in the middle and that suited me just fine. My altercations are tame in comparison to the fights I did see, I was lucky.
You must have a story about an altercation growing up? What happened, what did you do? And do you think about it to this day? I would love to hear from you.
