Seventy years ago, there was a bunch of us little boys, attending grade school, who were constantly harassed by a world-class bully. Unfortunately, in those days there was no one speaking out against "bullyism."
Those of us who were in old Clovis La Casita School (39-45) could've certainly used some help. At this distance in time, it is difficult for you the reader to understand our misery: dogged at ever step---at every event---at any and every moment, by a bully (we will call) "J.J." He practically ruined our lives. We lived in constant dread.
You see, all the kids who lived north of La Casita, on the streets
Kids in that area were chased, accosted, pushed around, slugged and/or beaten up by this
notorious character.
I don't know how many GRADES BEHIND he was in school. I don't even remember what grade he was in at any given time. Maybe the sixth grade ---for three years? He was thin, lanky, wiry, and hard-looking---not an ounce of fat. He was six inches taller than any of us. If you'd hit him with a hammer, I'm sure you would've heard: "CLANG!" He wasn't even your good old run-of-the-mill, down-home, garden-variety, benevolent neighborhood bully. He was mean!
We desperate kids soon developed an "escape and evade" route from our area to the school and home. It was---(now declassified) the alley between Thornton and Reid. Oh joy! We could go back and forth---unmolested!
That was the good news. The bad news was: he found out about that alley...and lay in wait--- he set ambushes! He would catch us by the front of our little shirts, push us all over the alley---like "what do you mean---being born?" Then he would slug us good--- right in the nose or stomach. I didn't have a preference---both hurt!
Catching him in the middle of a swing, we were off and running, like a bat! As they used to say about a track relay anchor-man----"Give him a two-step lead, with the race at stake, and no one on earth can catch him!" That's the way WE were. You see, we were...motivated. Our lives were at stake. We thought anyway. Who likes punishment?
Now I must explain. When I was in the third, fourth, and fifth grades, I was no Joe Louis. I was a very skinny little kid who just found himself on Earth one day. As the old saying goes, "I meant no harm." I wasn't really itching to clobber anybody. I was like Jack Nicholson in the movie "Mars Attack," when he said to the attacking Martians: "Can't we...just...get along?" (We know what happened to Jack, don't we?)
No. J.J. didn't want to "get along" with anybody...not us little guys...nor even the world, I suspect. What is inside that gnaws on a person like that?
He lived right across the alley from us, three houses down. He came by our house all the time down
Another funny story relating to this is: One night in mid-summer, we were sitting in our home, listening to the radio; it was hot and there was no air conditioning, the doors and windows were open, and kids were running around up and down the street. My dear friend and playmate (for many years), "Country Boy Bob," lived a block away on
We DID have a HERO---a tough little hombre who once stood up to J.J. I jealously must give him the credit---he risked his life. He really didn't have a choice. His dad told him one day: "Don't come home next time J.J. accosts you if you don't haul off and knock his block off!" Something like that, anyway...
So one infamous day, in the history of "escape alley," J.J. caught our hero and started pushing him around. Scared out of his wits (of his father, or J.J.---he was never quite sure which); Arthur J. Snipes SOCKED HIM ON THE JAW, as hard as he could, CLOBBERED HIM GOOD! Caught J.J. totally off guard and while he was standing there in surprise and amazement, Art, with that proverbial two-step lead of a relay anchor-man, made it home to safety. Hooray for our side! (Hey, Art, we're still in AWE!)
J.J. never bothered Art again; he just concentrated on the rest of us!
(When we got to Junior High, we never saw J.J. again.)
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BY MIL
9/07/12
Sent from my iPad
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