“What was the material portion of your life—meaning the most formative years of your life that bore most heavily on the man you have become?”
-Sol
This is quite an easy question to answer, so I apologize for the brevity.
On second thought, how about I rank the formative years of my life by decade, from least to most formative
50s
Deceased
This final decade of my life is nothing but a struggle to record what I have learned and pass on some experience and good will to some youngsters. I do not regard it as formative at all, but as a dissolution of body and soul.
40s
Least
My next to last decade of life was a simple application of lessons learned earlier in the various areas of endeavor in which I have been involved: workplace, combat space and writing.
20s
Leased
This was the tomb of my living death as a lowly laborer and husband. However, I did manage to read over 1000 books.
30s
Unleashed
I read roughly 2000 books during this period, fought half of my boxing matches and most of my stick-fights and interviewed hundreds of people about their violent experiences. I have still not yet rendered all that I learned during this period into writing.
Childhood
Lashed
Life as a soft, helpless, caring little tyke who just wanted to be liked taught me that society does not care about the child, that the child is a sculpture of liquid torment engraved with hatred and pain by its maleficent adult masters.
Teens
Leashed
As a teenager I learned that I was wrong about society, that society does care deeply about the quality of our torment and that it hates us. As a teenager I developed my many hatreds, all of which have fallen away as I fade back into childhood—hatred of Civilization.
While staying at a hotel in Philly with two of my fighters this past weekend I was suffering from severe eye seizures and instead of eating, sought cold colas and milkshakes, sucking it down on the right side of the mouth to induce unilateral brain freeze. I went to the diner next door, hosting a mere two other patrons and ordered a milkshake and soda. The waitress was my age. When she returned to take my food order I gave her the menu and asked for another soda and milkshake. She protested, saying it was not good for me.
I answered, “Look, girl, I’m a grandparent, firmly into my second childhood and you grownups are not telling me what to do any longer!”
She went off in a huff, brought back my drinks with a bill in which she charged me for the soda instead of giving me a refill.
If Man is God as the atheists believe, than he surely hates us all and I hate the bugger back!
When You're Food: Raw:
A Fighter’s View of Predatory Aggression: The Forever Autumn Press Edition
