June 27, 1997
O.W.P. Paper #2
Final Revision
Hart, Shannon
My mother made a remark once about how my brother and I hardly ever fought. As far as she could recollect, this was the truth. This statement, made in all sincerity and obvious senility caused me to laugh out loud.
"What!" she said. "I don't remember you guys ever getting into too many fights. Oh sure, you argued here and there, but basically you two got along." I rolled on the floor with laughter. She was dead serious, and I laughed even harder. She squinted her eyes and gave me the kind of stare a skeptic in the audience of a David Copperfield performance might give. She was looking for the trick, but was hopelessly deceived.
You really couldn't fault mother. I'm pretty sure that early in our lives she thought of us as one entity. We were two individuals morphed into one. She bought us matching clothes and matching toys. Although we were two years and two days apart, in her eyes we had the same birthday, and often received the same gifts. One year my brother and I got bikes. They were exactly alike. They were green and black with black fenders. They were really nice-looking bikes. My brother and I looked at each other, then back at our mom. Oh yeah. They were nice. Thank you very much. They were just what we wanted. We took our bikes outside to the garage. Neither one of us said anything. We stood there and just stared at the bikes. Finally, I stepped forward and tore the fenders off one of the bikes.
"That one is yours," I said. He didn't say anything. He accepted his older brother's Solomonesque decision. THAT was the way things were in our relationship. Oh sure, he didn't like it weeks later when it rained, and we rode our bikes through the mud, and he got the splatter marks and I didn't, and mom wanted to know why he took the fenders off his bike. But that was his problem. That was our relationship, in a nutshell.
If you were to interview the other kids in our neighborhood, they would certainly tell you of the fantastic battles they were witness to. They wouldn't be talking about the latest movie they saw on late night Kung Fu Theater, but rather the latest action-adventure episode of my brother and I. Once, they will say, they saw me hold my brother in a head-lock for a good 2 1/2 hours. They won't remember why (the "why" was never important. It could've been because he was wearing my Han Solo t-shirt, or because he scored the winning touchdown in our big street- football game), but, they'll say, we watched until our mothers began calling us home for dinner. The fight was called on account of darkness. Doubtless it was continued the next day. They were the Muhammad Ali and George Foreman of their day, they'll say. But you know what? I think that they really kind of liked each other, someone else will say.
My father was not as blind to our "tough love" as mother was. One day, he came home from work carrying a couple of boxes. "These are for you. The next time you two have an argument, I want you to use these. Remember, don't let mom know that I got these for you, and no using your feet." In the boxes were two pairs of bright red leather boxing gloves. My brother and I tried them on. We jabbed at each other. We feigned left, then right. Neither one of us actually threw a blow at each other. The gloves stayed in our bedroom, under our bunk beds ,for at least two weeks until one fateful Saturday morning. We were arguing about something like who could make noises utilizing the most body parts (remember, the "why" is not important. I'm sure great wars between countries were started with much less), and of course, things escalated. The gloves came out, and my brother and I walked calmly out to the back yard. We strapped the large gloves onto our small hands and gave each other junk-yard-dog stares.
"Hey, what are you guys doing?" It was our neighbor's son, Duke. Duke was the neighborhood bully. He was way older than us. He was fifteen and big.
"We're going to box, " I said. My eyes never left my brother's.
"Let me try," said Duke. "I'll fight both of you guys at once. I bet I could whoop both of you if I wanted to."
My brother, who was growing less and less confident in fighting me, began taking his gloves off. Duke jumped over the fence separating our yards, and before I knew it, he had the other pair of gloves on. Over the next hour and a half, Duke proceeded to beat the crap out of my brother and I. First one at a time, then like he proposed, both of us at once. Obviously overmatched, my brother and I were nonetheless undeterred, and I must say, we fought valiantly. Somewhere in between roundhouse rights and uppercut lefts, my brother and I shared a certain commonality. We were together. We were both getting the crap beat out of us. There was something poetic in that, but dizzy and not sure what street we lived on, my brother and I simply thanked Duke for our beating, and we stumbled back inside the house. We didn't fight each other that day, and in fact, I don't think we fought each other for at least several days after that. Months later, when we were alone, my father asked me about the boxing gloves. I told him that we lost them. We actually threw them in the trash, hoping to God that we never would see them again.
That day didn't stop us from wanting to beat each other's brains in, but it also wasn't the last time that we fought side by side. I don't remember the last time we traded blows, but I am glad to say that it was so long ago that even I don't remember.
You were right mom. We never fought over anything, and yeah, we got along. That would make her happy. Her boys were angels and could do no wrong, but of course, that's another story.