On Mourning Violence

Originally written October 14th, 2007

I was speaking with my father tonight. My father is a very wise man, who I don’t get to speak to nearly as often as I could and who I haven’t listened to nearly as often as I should. I cannot remember how we got on the subject, but he was telling me about when he used to live in Boston. He was telling me about how, on one early morning, he went out for a jog. During his run, he encountered two men who attempted to mug him. One grabbed his arm, and my father shoved him to the ground while the other tried to sweep my father’s legs. My father dodged him and began to punch this man in the face as hard as he could, over and over. Through the blood and the broken teeth, this man started to scream “Stick it in him! Stick it in him!” Terrified, my father thrust his thumbs into this man’s eye sockets, causing him to collapse to the ground in agony. My father ran as fast as he could. Tonight, my father told me that he still remembers how his eyes felt, and that he still regrets feeling like he had to do that.