The High Horse that (Nearly) Kicked My Ass

When I was living in New York in my early 20's, Mickey turned me onto an Irish pub near Irving Plaza called Shades of Green. We loved this place. The owners, real Irishmen and women, treated us like family, welcoming us by name and bringing our preferred drinks to the table without ever asking for our order. The walls were emerald green, the wooden booths well-worn and polished by thousands of Manhattan ass and the jukebox stocked my favorite tunes (it's possible I've spent $100 over the course of my time there just listening to the Stones' "Beast of Burden"). From the kitchen came Irish staples like authentic bangers and mash and the perfect Shepherd's Pie.

On one particular Friday evening, Mickey and I found Shades to be quite crowded. Despite this, we elbowed our way through and settled into a booth across from the bar. Mary (oh, sweet sweet Mary) found us and brought Mickey his kamikaze and me my bottle of Bud. As I was poor at the time, I was rolling my smokes while Mickey helped himself to one of his Camels. We proceeded to get our drink on, as was the habit on many a night at our beloved Shades.

It was then that I heard it... him.

"So the bitch looks at me like I did something wrong. And I'm like, 'Bitch, your daughter can't read and you're looking like I did something to you?' And she's looking at me through these cheap sunglasses."

I looked over towards the bar to see a couple of 30-something suits shooting the shit. The guy talking was obviously unwinding after a long day with his collar undone and sleeves rolled up. His boys nodded and smirked as he continued his story of woe.

"The thing is she can't speak English. And I'm like, 'We can get an interpreter for you.'"

"What language does she speak?"

"Fuck if I know. Cantonese? Mandarin? Japanese? Point is the bitch doesn't speak English."

Now we pause here to get a little backstory on me. All my life, I've heard a lot of similar smack-talking about people who don't speak English. And I've heard people smack-talk about "my kind of people" to my face. And all my life, I've been able to put it away, to somehow excuse this ignorant behavior and take the high road by letting it lie. But somehow tonight, things felt a little different.

"I said to her, 'Hey, can you take off your sunglasses?' and she's looking at me like I just asked her to... I don't know... give a shit. But you know what she says to me? 'I can't stay to talk with you.' You believe this shit? The bitch can't speak English but she knows she can't stay to talk to me. Probably has to go cash her welfare check or something."

And that did it. Something in me snapped. Mickey saw it all over my face. He saw it in my exhales of smoke. The next time Mary stopped by to check on us, I asked her to deliver another round of whatever the guy was drinking along with a napkin on which I scribbled:

"Courtesy of a Mandarin-handled welfare check"

Clever, no? Mary replied, "Of course, darling," and she delivered.

Mickey and I waited, quietly sipping our beverages while listening to the sounds of a man being handed his ass. It didn't take long for this guy to figure out who sent him the drink. Hmm... perhaps the two twitchy fellas in the booth within earshot of them who were doing their best to look cool? Oh yeah, and one of them was... how do you say?... ASIAN?!

The guy (whom I shall call Mitch from here on out) sat down next to Mickey, across from me and placed the napkin on the table.

"Did you write this shit?"

I smiled at him.

"Do you know what I've been through today? I work my ass off, put up with all the bullshit at work and come here to blow off some steam and then I get this shit?"

I started rolling another cigarette.

"You're going to ruin my evening? Cause I'm blowing off some steam? Cause I'm here with my friends having a drink?"

One of Mitch's guys sits next to me, across from Mickey. Mickey shoots me a look as if to say, "what the hell are you getting us into?"

I lick the sealing of my cigarette.

"Fuck you!"

With that, Mitch crumbles up the napkin and throws it into my face. Now a normal man would respond to that. Physically, probably. There would be an exchange of sorts followed by some blows and then we'd be escorted outside by management. On the sidewalk, the fight would escalate until the cops were called.

But that's not what happened. What happened was I froze up. I hadn't thought it through. I had only thought of what a badass move it would be to send this guy another drink with such a badass note. And now, I was going to get my ass kicked. But that's not what happened either. When I didn't react, Mitch knew then that nothing was going to happen. He explained that he was a teacher in a rough part of town (to which I replied that I was a teacher in a rough part of town). He offered his hand in friendship and I didn't accept it. And we left it at that. His crew left after that and Mickey and I breathed a sigh of relief. As the night wore on and we got increasingly drunker, we laughed about how ridiculous it would have been had we gotten in a fight as we both knew that we would have been slaughtered. I can fully admit now that it was a cowardly act disguised as a brave one -- a petty move in place of a more righteous one. I hope that the me now would have confronted him as an adult and discussed rather than dismissed. But hindsight is, as they say, 20-20.

"In some ways, it would have been fun had we did get in a fight," I offered. "It would have been fun to draw some blood and I bet we could have picked up a couple of chicks looking real macho with our cuts and bruises."

Mickey and I laughed about it all night. And more than ten years later, we're still laughing about it. Had we actually gotten our asses kicked, I doubt either of us would be talking about it.