Today's MOSTLY TRUE SHORT STORY: More Than A Slap

It was over 50 years ago and I still remember it like it happened yesterday.

I must have been about 12 or 13 at the time and was hanging with another boy around the same age. His name was Bobby (no last names here). We were not real friends, at least not at that point. But I sure wanted to be. In my mind, he was just the toughest kid around. And toughness was something that I admired. Unlike frail me, he was never going to be bullied. He wasn't too big but very muscular and had dark skin befitting his Southern Italian heritage. In a way, he was everything that I thought I wanted to be.

I struck up a conversation with him. To my recollection, it wasn't anything particularly important - just small talk really. I was doing most of the talking and he was being aloof, befitting, I thought, his tough guy image. Then I said something (to this day I don't know what it was) that ticked him off. Suddenly, without warning, he slapped me as hard as he could across the side of my head. He then said something to the effect that I was getting too familiar - whatever the fuck that meant.

What I do remember was going partially deaf from the blow and that my ear was burning hot. It hurt like hell. Worse still was the shock and embarrassment of having it happen to me!

I put my hand to my face and cried out, why the hell did you do that? I received no response.

I basically just faded away that day - and from him forever. I don't believe that I ever even saw him again. Ever. He was dead in my mind anyway. In fact, and forgive me, but when I did find out that he had passed, I laughed (the LAST laugh) - I had outlived him - by a lot!

To this day, I have never forgotten the shame and degradation inflicted upon me by another man. Slapping is the ultimate insult. It would have actually been better if had knocked me out with a sucker punch.

So, when people try to justify The Slap Heard 'Round The World, remember my story. The message was clear - it wasn't just the violence but also the dominance of one human being over another - caused by a perceived insult. The resulting chaos was inevitable.

I understand that Mr. Smith has apologized to his victim, Chris Rock. And, that's certainly a step in the right direction. We all make mistakes. Some bigger than others. However, how we resolve them makes all the difference. I never received an apology from my attacker. So the wound it caused festered and left an ugly scar. And the world is been wounded enough. Let's learn from this, heal, and move on.

Today's MOZEN: Just One Little Man

Words and Photo by F LoBuono

There are days like today when an overwhelming sadness overtakes me. It may be caused by cold, grey and chilly weather, a bad night's sleep or, perhaps, a minor disagreement with a loved one.

However, even though they may be contributing factors, the reasons run deeper and are much more profound.

At least they are to me.

Some may equate this feeling with depression, but I don't feel that's entirely accurate either. Rather, it can best be described as a type of mourning, a despondency for the state of the world itself. It's born out of a sense of frustration and impotence with my inability to change the world in any truly significant way.

Afterall, I mean I'm just one, little man. What CAN I do?

Well, most of my resentment is with the fact that yet another LITTLE MAN (one man, really) is creating such wanton, willful death and destruction around the world - and there seems to be virtually nothing that I can do about it.

How can this be? How could one, little man's ego get that huge that he doth stride the narrow world. Like a Colossus, and we petty men. Walk under his huge legs and peep about. To find dishonorable graves.

If I had a gun, would I (could I) execute him? If I had an army, would I (could I) destroy him?

Well, I don't have either.

But I can still fight back in the only way that one, little man can - with integrity and unwavering desire to always attempt to do the right thing; to treat others, ALL others, with dignity and respect. To never yield, even in the face of impossible odds, to greed, avarice, cruelty and depravity.

And, remember, when just one, little man/woman is joined by another, and then another, and so on until the day comes when we won't be so little any more. THEN we will change the world and send ALL of the Putins to the hell in which they belong.