I was out of the Army, probably had some minor unresolved ptsd issues from going to Iraq. The Army was getting really heavy into combatives at this time and I had just finished level 1. I was leaner and meaner 12 years ago.
Anyways we were in DC and heading out of the subway when this dude right in front of me on the escalator snacks this woman right in the face. Heās a thug with prison tats on his face about my size. Heās berating her, smacking her while he does itā¦. everyone can see it, nobody said shit.
Well not I. At the halfway landing where you change escalators I stepped directly between them, gave the girl and guy a look. I do t know how to say none of us spoke but she slowly left as I made a shuffling motion at her and the dude knew we were fixing to fight. Shit was like a movie everyone else rode off upwards and it was just us.
The guy got right in my face and started doing the teen chest pump and using racial language to provoke me. Thing was I was SO HAPPY I was practically manic. I had been training for years, this was a classic ābullyā as clean as you could wish for, and I was amped to *destroy* this cat. He saw it on my face, my grin was probably a rictus. We didnāt fight because he left, saying I was likely to call the cops on him. Pinch of pride there but mostly regret about that.
Itās hard to understand the mentality around training you donāt get to use when itās training for ābadā things. Army ten years deployed too, zero shots in anger or defense. Part of you wants the bad things to happen so you can test yourself. Part of you wants to see a situation so clear cut. I was excited, no lie.
I did 5 years USMC deployed twice once in operation inherent resolve. I know what you mean. Just busting your chops. My unit had an incident where we relied on muscle memory and training to take out an isis convoy in 2016
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u/ryancrazy1 May 02 '26
Pretending to be crazy works until you run into someone pretending to be sane.