I started a post about Hair Gropenfurher this morning. Then something really started to piss me off in the hour it took to get home, get changed and get to the gym. I work with somebody I’ve named Banana Slug. He is about that emotionally intelligent. Maybe you heard this one, that your level of intelligence decreases with the increase in emotional arousal. Angry people are really, really stupid. This guy suffers from anxiety and depression. So, the anxiety makes him emotionally stupid. I think it affects his intelligence as well. He’s not an idiot. Wound up though, you would think his brain was a couple of moldy peas.

This is what is pissing me off. One of his funny things is to make like he is going to hit me with an object. Sometimes it is a laptop, today it was a screwdriver he began to throw at me. Once he stood in my way in the tunnel between buildings to see if he could stop me. He could not. I walked through him. He’s repeatedly acted like he is going to hit me. Can I beat his ass? No? Shit.
[23-feb-2017] Today, after this has been posted for a couple of weeks, Banana Slug finds it funny to air-punch me in the face repeatedly as a joke. I held my ground and did nothing. Am I a pussy for not answering his aggression? Maybe. I’ll take a loss of reputation for the long game victory of either getting him to stop or becoming a victim.
Let Me Be a Victim
With the culture that we have, which elevates victims to demi-gods, you want to be the victim. So, he kept punching close enough to my face that I could feel the air move. I did not flinch, “In many places what you just did can get you killed. Not everyone is as patient as I am. Stop it. Just stop it.”[end 23-feb-2017 edit]
Guys like him are punks. I don’t care that he has a mental illness. You don’t get to threaten like that forever without running into the one guy who takes the threat seriously and cuts you so your intestines are distended and bleeding. Think I am making this up? A homeless guy I knew from a shelter taunted another one of us in a park long enough that he was gutted with a hunting knife. The docs were able to sew him back together but he was never the same. I live in the ghetto. Disrespect like that gets you hurt or killed.
One of Richmond’s murders in 2016 was two friends arguing over a girl. The one holding the gun was being taunted by the other. The tauntee bragged that the taunted would not have the cojones to pull the trigger. That was a deadly mistake. Now two families have to cope with loss. The tauntee is now a corpse and the taunted is now a convicted murderer doing prison time.
Neither Hospital nor Jail
I can’t be the guy that puts him in the hospital. I am a convicted wife beater. I’ve been told by a judge that if I appear before the bench for another violent crime I am going to prison for a long time. It’s been since 2002 that I’ve put my hands on someone. It’s been a long 15 years to get to today where I have a good job, a home and a car. It would really suck to throw all that away on a little bitch like Banana Slug.
So, if he ever does hit me this is what will happen: I’ll cry like a little bitch. I’ll whine and moan. You’ll think I’d been murdered. I’m totally going for victim mode. Between hospital and jail I’m choosing hospital.
It’s still true in the ghetto. You attack someone’s honor you’d better be armed. Otherwise, you are getting shot, cut, or beaten, or all three. You can’t disrespect a man. You can’t “almost” punch him or feint a thrown screwdriver. That’s a threat that must be answered with force. The defense attorney will argue that you needed to be wounded or killed because of the provocation.
I Fart Words in a Banana Slug Direction
So, this is my revenge. I’m taking the revenge of a bard and posting about him. It’s actually sort of fucked up because he’s married and if he does complete the attack he’s going to lose his job and initiate a cascade of disasters that may be hard to recover from. There are no kids, thank God. He’s married to a cat lady and speaks lovingly of his fur babies. Eew.
I still believe that bullies, punks like Banana Slug act out this way because they are afraid. The victim they pick is seen as a threat to them. You win the head game by either spinning up their perceived level of threat and trigger worse behavior (rather risky) or you find a way to get them to stop being such pussies. Shunning is an option. One I don’t have without finding another job.
I already know what I’m going to do about Banana Slug. I’ll do what I’ve done for 15 years, maybe longer. Lead with grace and mercy and pray for myself and for BS that we will break the spell of his anxiety so he doesn’t need to threaten me. There is a good man somewhere in all that fear being shouted down by the other voices in his life telling him that he should be afraid.
Stillness in Motion
When I walked through him I felt his will. I knew when I placed my hand on his chest and kept walking that he was pitiable. His life force (氣) is weak and unbalanced. This also makes him dangerous because the imbalance can cause him to make rash mistakes that would hurt both of us. So, the manner in which I defeat him becomes important.
My strength comes from my faith rooted in love. I will win because darkness has never overcome light. Banana Slug invested a ton of money in New Age personal growth seminars and his qi is still out of whack. I achieved a degree of strength while training in 合氣 柔術. My greatest strength came years later when I deeply surrendered to Christ. It is His power, His strength combined with the bits that I remember of jujitsu that assure my victory. Banana Slug is like a lot of Christians that mistake ecstatic worship experiences for spirit filled living. Actual spirit-filled living is a lot more annoying for us first-worldies.
Writing this helps. Banana Slug is a stupid punk. His hell on earth is not over. As he doubles down on the things that will continue to give him duress things will only escalate. He is tasty and the devil remains ever hungry. It is a sorry thing to see.
#WWJD
Giving your life to Christ isn’t an e-ticket express to an absence of misery or poverty. If anything, it is the beginning of a long, miserable death to this world. All your shit becomes front and center in your life. Christ isn’t content to just watch you allow Satan to slowly bleed you into a bottle to be consumed. He demands fealty and obedience. Life as you have known it is thrown into chaos. There are new ways of living to figure out. New rules, new habits, more structure than you had before you said you wanted to give your life to Jesus. There are all these new responsibilities you didn’t have before. This goes on for the rest of your life.
Some bad Banana Slug habits:
- The “I don’t know that” gambit. It is a bald-faced lie attempted as a move to get one’s self out of check. It usually fails. One of his variants is, “I’m so confused”, which seems to mean, “I’m so surprised you haven’t believed the lie I told”.
- Shutting down. This is distinct from the anger management time out. Time Outs exist to give everybody a chance to turn down the emotional heat so some brain cells can be reactivated and people can converse on more balanced terms. Shutting down is some degree of catatonia. It is a choice to not cope with the circumstances you find yourself in.
- Lying. Lying kills relationships faster than a hungry rattlesnake. It destroys trust. That creates a toxic atmosphere engendering perceived threats to values and psychological needs. If not dealt with well it’s very easy to fall into the old abuse cycles again, physical or otherwise.
Die to Live
Three is enough. We Christians have been dealing with fucked up people our entire history. Jesus wasn’t exactly a model establishment citizen. Turning over tables in the Temple and chasing people around with a whip doesn’t help your reputation as a sober and seasoned scholar of the Torah. So, when we talk about repentance, reconciliation and such we come from a place of authority built out of long experience. Our “die to live” isn’t just a bumper sticker worthy aphorism. We can and do help people deal with their shit and stop being such punks. We are worldwide and meet every Sunday morning for worship.
Banana Slug? He’s just an annoyance I have to work with. It’ll come out ok. I got 1500 words posted to this blog because of his bullshit. God has a way of using messes like this one to make beautiful things. I suspect he will this time also. Bottom of the post. I’m good. Thank you for reading this.
Last thing. If you are a victim of a punk and feel intimidated, speak up. Say something to someone. Don’t let the asshat win by stuffing the misery and maintaining the secret. Bullying and abusive behavior need fair consequences through appropriate help. As the victim the power to trigger those fair consequences is yours. Use it.