How A Bar Fight in College Changed My Perspective on People and the World

Some get caught up in the winds, and others know to take down their sails

I stood outside the bar on the sidewalk surrounded by concrete, muscle and night. The air had the cutting edge of autumn cold. It all seemed silly. I laughed, more of a giggle, shrill and high pitched.

Those days, I laughed a lot. Sometimes my laughter provoked uncertain looks. “Is there something funny, or is he out of his mind?” People don’t attack when they’re wrestling with that question. It’s instinct. Even when drunk, the lessons of evolution step in and force caution.

Nobody knows you all that well and you might be unhinged.

That was the whole point. I preferred not to fight. But they couldn’t know that.

To my left, my roommate argued with the bouncer. “I have to go back in and get my hat.” My roommate was six foot one and angry. He’d been escorted out because he’d tackled somebody and landed about fifteen punches to the face.

“You’re not going back in,” said the bouncer who was six foot three and nervous. He should have known better than to reveal his fear.

“Uh, I think I am going back in. That hat has sentimental value.” I could tell by my roommate’s voice that what he really meant was, “If you don’t get out of the way, you’re giving me permission to hit you.”

The bouncer didn’t say anything, so I felt my time had come.

“Can I go back in and look for it?” I asked.

Electricity crackled between the two men. Slowly, they turned to look at me. I stood there smiling like a goofball, like an animated character from a children’s film. I was sober. It would be five more years before I started drinking.

Image by Walter Rhein

Neither the bouncer nor my roommate said anything, so I kept the floor. I tapped my roommate on the chest. “You just wait out here for a second, I’ll go back in and find your hat.” I turned to the bouncer. “Assuming you’re okay with that.”

The bouncer still tried to look tough, but I could see he was relieved. Darn right he should be relieved. I was diffusing the situation with my silly good humor. He wasn’t so blinded by macho, “alpha-male” BS, that he couldn’t recognize I was trying to help.

The bouncer gave me a short nod. I turned to my roommate, “No more fighting.” Then I went in.

It was dark in there, even darker than the street. The air in the street had seemed blue. The air in the bar was red. There wasn’t any sign of the guy my roommate had been fighting. Everything had gotten back to normal. I did a circuit, looking for the hat. It was a scruffy baseball cap with a frayed visor.

Halfway through the circuit, I found the girl I’d been talking to before the combatants had thumped into my back.

“Hey,” she said.

“Hey,” I replied.

“So, what’s going on?”

“My roommate decided to do the ‘man dance’ with some dude,” I said. “I’m trying to stop him from fighting the bouncers now.”

“Oh.”

“If you give me your number, I’ll let you know how it all turned out.”

She scribbled her number on a piece of paper and handed it over. I waved goodbye and continued my search. A few days later I called her. We dated briefly. Meeting somebody had been the whole point of going to the bar, not getting between deranged brutes who wanted to beat on each other.

I didn’t find the hat. My internal clock said that I needed to get back outside. I recalled the sight of my roommate on the floor pounding on the other guy. He looked like a giant crab. Fights are awkward and sloppy. Just once I wish they’d depict them as such in a film. There’s no way to fight without looking ridiculous.

Outside, I was pleasantly surprised to see that my roommate was leaning against the brick wall. The bouncer was keeping an eye on him, but also keeping his distance. I hoped he’d been out in the cold long enough for his temperature to go down.

“I didn’t find it, let’s go.”

“I can’t leave without my hat,” he said, but the urgency had left his voice.

“Come on man, let’s get out of here. Let’s go to another bar and meet some people. Come on. Come on.”

The bouncer had gotten all bristly again like he thought there’d be trouble, and that was a mistake. Getting bristly is taken as a challenge. But by some miracle my roommate had started to see reason. We turned and walked away. There were other bars. There were always other bars.

Inside the next place, I turned to him. “Well, what happened?”

“Some guy bumped into me,” my roommate explained. “I said, ‘I think you owe me an apology.’ He said, ‘I don’t think I do.’” He shrugged as if to say his response was self-explanatory. Like, the guy had to be hit because of that.

I realized then that he’d come out that night either to meet a girl or to meet a man. Either one would suffice to work out the knot of frustration wound up within him. He’d gotten what he wanted, he looked relaxed now.

We listened to the music for a while. Time passed.

The door opened and two police officers came in followed by the bouncer from the other bar. The bouncer marched up to my roommate and pointed at him. It looked like the Sistine Chapel. We got escorted.

Once again, I was surrounded by concrete, muscle and night. We were pushed up against a brick wall. The angry officer became less angry with me when he realized I hadn’t been drinking. Plus, I started to laugh again.

I felt like I was in a time loop, only now my roommate was getting bristly with the police. The police didn’t want to fight him either, but they were better at hiding it. Also, they weren’t scared like the bouncer. Once again I had to step in and guide the altercation to a peaceful conclusion.

I said some things. I’m the violence whisperer. That’s the part I play.

My roommate got hauled away in handcuffs. The disagreement got settled in a well-lit courtroom, away from the darkness and the concrete and the cold hard night. None of them, not the police, not the bouncer, not my roommate, ever recognized my gentle turning of the dial.

I’m fine with that, no marks on my record.

When I’m not around, people end up inflicting all sorts of damage upon themselves. I’ve found it’s best to avoid that sort of tempest, but the voice of reason is drowned out for those caught within the echoes of their rage.

Such foolish anger is both futile and fiercely comical.

All of these discounts are forever.

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