Alpha Birds

In the neighborhood where I grew up, I was tormented by a classic bully. This kid was the picture of toughness: He had long stringy blond hair that hung down over his eyes, and he punctuated his sentences by spitting between the gap in his front teeth. I remember the rumors about him breaking into homes and stealing things.

He was an alpha type through and through, and I was afraid of him. Sensing my fear the way a dog can sense it in a person, he singled me out for the worst of his bullying. If he saw me on the street, he would give me a shove and mock me, egging me on to fight him. During our neighborhood pickup football games, he would take cheap shots at me and throw a few punches in hopes of provoking a fight.

For a long time, I backed down from any confrontation with this bully. But the more I yielded, the more the intimidation continued – until one day I finally reached the breaking point.

In a scene that had become all too familiar, he once again started shoving me and challenging me to fight him in front of the whole neighborhood. I felt the usual twinge of fear, but this time it was mixed with something else. I thought, “Screw this. A black eye and fat lip can’t be any worse than getting humiliated every day.”

So I launched myself at him, my fists swinging with pent-up rage. He punched back, and the two of us kept pummeling each other until we were exhausted and someone finally pulled us apart.

The blond-haired spitter never taunted me again after that day.

The lesson I learned was this: It’s good to avoid fights whenever we can, and it’s always wise to look for a peaceful resolution to disputes. But sometimes in life we encounter a bully who can’t be reasoned with – someone who understands nothing but force and intimidation.

I once read where the Dalai Lama – the worldwide champion of peaceful resolution – regretted that the Tibetans had not done more to resist when the Chinese invaded Tibet in 1950, subsequently destroying over 6,000 Buddhist monasteries, burning sacred texts and imprisoning and torturing innocent monks and nuns.

Sometimes we have no choice but to stand up to the alpha birds of this world.

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Photographer’s Footnote: I photographed this alpha bird chasing another bird off its perch on Alcatraz Island in San Francisco.