slugfest from deeper inside -- inside the shorts of b1

and then there is va vegan.

he came to me as nothing more than a nice guy wanting to link to my blog. in exchange for his pleasantry, i essentially mocked him and told him to step up to the bar.

know for the record, and forever, if you have even the tiniest bit of doubt: he is a champion. he is fearless and courageous.

he's a dying breed of gentleman. even the most perfunctory of our exchanges were courteous and cheerful. at the very least he's the head of a family and a student. he strikes me as the over-achieving type, so he is probably also somehow responsible for feeding everyone in his family as well (just for the record, i am not suggesting he's a black-market poet). that he was able to pull this off, with both grace and charm, is a testament to both his character and spirit.

he's also at best, a liar. he implied his haiku wasn't worthy and then proceeded, for one week straight, to beat me about the head and ears with a keyboard. i'm lucky to have escaped alive, let alone with a positive nod from the judges.

until the slugfest i'd never believed the rumors that i'm sure you've all heard: there are living wraiths amongst us that are more-than-willing, if not eager, to lull people into a sense of false comfort then brutalize them with language. (and i'll admit here, for the first time ever, that it is in fact the reason i don't write limericks.) i wouldn't go so far as to say that's what the vegan is, but there's certainly "more than a little" circumstantial evidence.

as a kid i worked as a cashier in a pharmacy that was actually a front for a low-key bookie operation. we'd get dozens of loudmouths and wiseguys through the door and by the perfect developmental age of 17 i was able to put nearly all of 'em down with a sentence or two (dopes could be had with a single word).

the vegan is a lot of things, but he's not from those categories. he's something closer to what appears to be a cute jack-in-the-box toy that's actually (SPROING! SURPRIZE!) a spitting cobra.

i mean come on, look back at his work. i mean really thumb through it. do you see anything there that hints at his greatness here? anything? no. in retrospect he is very clearly a poetic wolf in sheep's clothing.

i know what you're thinking, i thought it too, but my camp has thoroughly researched his communications and whereabouts -- it's as true as it is unbelievable: he actually wrote that stuff himself. no help.

which means he's played completely by the rules. he is, to use an mc hammer phrase, "legit."

but that doesn't mean the situation isn't worth exploring, at least a little ...

we know he's a cyclist -- is he a blood doper? probably. but remember, that's not only not against the rules, it's actually encouraged. i went through four pints myself over the week.

he's a vegan, did he accidentally get a piece of steroid-laden meat? maybe. it would certainly explain his behavior, including the noticeable sag at the end. but if you read the verse and really think about it, it feels like chlorophyll.

we all know, for sure, he's a super-competitor and fires himself up for a contest. if i knew he was going to be that tough, i would have done something a little more creative like starting the competition and then telling him the rules three days later.

but let's open the door to my soul and look deeper, shall we?

i truly believe in the buddhist concept of duality: that the world can be divided an infinite number of ways in a yin and a yang. as part of this, i see two kinds of people: those who battle their inner demons, and those who do not.

i can't speak for the vegan, i don't know him well enough, but i most sincerely and honestly hope, both for himself and his family, that he's one of those who is not compelled to fight.

demon fighters are all around. hemingway was one, mikkel is one (it's almost certainly a contributing factor to why i adore and admire his writing), the last guy you walked past begging with a change cup is one, so am i. in case you're not getting the point, it's not something to be envied -- i'm not bragging about it -- it's simply a state of being i'm trying to explain to make a deeper point.

i've lived a life fraught with self-imposed versions of insecurity, uncertainty, doubt, and questions of worth. as a result i can be a procrastinator or an over-achiever. i can be heartless or warm. i can achieve the nearly unimaginable or barely function.

you can view the slugfest a million ways and you better believe i will (fear not, my dear, dear reader -- i'll will be spare you anything further than this post). but in the pit of my soul, at the very bottom, where the ugly things refuse to die, there is a deep-rooted sense of truth. and that truth knows that the vegan bested me.

and a day is coming, very soon, when i'll be cutting through the alley to my favorite diner. the night will be chilly, dark and just a little malefic. i'll be trying to shake my mind of the things in my world that i allow to hold me in such an uncomfortable grip. the wind will blow ever so gently on my back and leaves will rustle past me.

in that moment i won't think there is someone behind me, but instead for reasons i will never know, i'll suddenly think of the vegan. "hoosier daddy." the leaves will become oddly prominent and baleful. the alley will seem to grow longer and the wind will clutch me under the jaw.

i'll want to be anywhere but there. i'll want to be anyone but me. and yet, i'll have to deal with both.

you'd think that just knowing that was going to happen would be enough to keep me out of that alley. but no. i'm a little lazy, i always look forward to the diner, and i like taking the shortcut that most people are afraid of.

the funny thing is, having to experience it all isn't the worst part. the worst part is that the first occurance won't be the last time in my life that it happens.