28FEB26 – Cigars and Fight Night for Reals

It’s a Saturday with a slow paced morning. Plans are big today, including treadmills, books both written in and read, schooling for my skillset, cleaning and clean eating. Last night while enjoying a drink and a cigar on my patio, a fight broke out on the street level between 3 men. 2 men being challenged by one man. Everyone definitely seemed agitated and aggressive, although I could quite hear all the things they were yelling at each other, but you could tell things were going to set off as they spilled out in to the street. Once the fight jumped off the one man was doing pretty well until he got caught with a punch and went down. The two men then pounced and started to punch and kick him while he turtled in to a ball yelling that “It’s Enough, It’s Enough, You Win”. It looked more like a school yard showdown than a true beating; however, they were adults and the hits were real and solid. I observed all my neighbours out on their balconies, some of them recording, some of them on the phone probably with police, but all of them watching and nobody intervening. Cars would drive around the men fighting as if they were not there. Someone from one of the balconies yelled out that the police were on their way in hopes to halt the fighting. It didn’t work. The police came tearing down the street in full force, sirens blare echoing down the hallways of all the buildings, lights dancing across all the reflective window walls. It screamed that authority was coming and it was coming fast and hard. 8 police cars showed up. The police station is only a few blocks from here so they arrived in record time and in record numbers. The fight had already disbanded, and when it did, the solo fighter approached the two men that just showed him a beatdown with hand extended to shake and saying “All’s fair in love and war Bro”. The participants didn’t scramble or leave the area with the approaching police; which surprised me a little. The cops all parked sporadically across the road in some sort of random chaotic pattern. Police exited their cars and seems to walk around with their hands inside their flack jackets questioning anyone that was around, including the fighters. A strange random stray dog came out of nowhere and sat about 15 feet away form the group of chaos and just watched. As if it’s owner was one of the group and it was just waiting until their business was done so that it could continue on it’s midnight walk. However, the dog belonged to nobody and it just hung out as a calm spectator like the dozens still standing on their balconies watching the police do their thing. Nobody seems to be searched, arrested, or even have a sense of what is going on. Police were walking around, the participants seemed to talk to one police officer then another, then to each other, all the while the road is blocked and the flashing lights spun around the condo buildings like it was a red and blue rave night. The solo fighter seemed to get some water so he could wash his face, whether that be because he had bloodied it or because he had some road dirt on it from laying face down in the street while he was getting kicked. There was definitely no sense of urgency or really a sense of how this chaos was going to conclude. And really, who’s dog was that. The pooch was intently watching and seems interested in this mish mash of cops and civilians figuring out life. Finally the fights were let go without incident, the police all talked among themselves for a bit; I would assume to draw straws on who was going to write up the paperwork on this one. Then they finally turned off the carnival lights and headed back to the station and I retired to bed. Where I closed my eyes knowing that my life no longer includes any of that chaos, chaos that I was so comfortable in as a child that my mind thought it was the norm and without it I would seek it. I slept well knowing that.