I was just thinking about one boyhood fight. We were playing sandlot football. I was playing QB and doing well, which enraged a player on the other side, who played tackle on the HS football team. Pushing and shoving lead to an out and out fight. Several friends decided to intervene. Two grabbed me but only one managed to grab him, giving him a wide-open sucker punch, breaking my nose and my right maxillary process. I told my parents. Nothing happened.
My first fight was with a neighbor a couple of years older and 50 lb heavier. He'd been harassing me. We were about nine and 11 or so. We were playing marbles and he yelled "Grabbies," and grabbed up all the marble. Now, his dad was the town heroin dealer and also ran girls, so this kid had had an apartment behind the house, separate from the house and he headed there. I tackled him. We wrestled and I worked around until I had both my arms and my legs wrapped around him. I have a pointy chin and I planted it into his spine. Every time he struggled, I ratcheted down tighter, until he was screaming and crying for relief. At that point, his grandmother came out and rescued him. I even helped her get him up the stairs to his apartment.
Fast forward about 65 years or so. I was at dinner with my BIL and my sister, nine years older than I. She asked if I remembered the fight I had with Donnie *****. I asked what she knew about that. She replied that she and my mother watched it. (I must have had better concentration back then.) She said that she'd asked my mother if they should break it up. My mother - my own mother - replied that "No, Donnie has been making life miserable for Earle and, besides, he's doing pretty good." My, have things changed...
I guess the 40s and 50s weren't as idyllic as I thought. Do you know what became of Donnie?
