The Punch in the Jaw

Jeff Biggers showed up in Mrs. Powers’ fourth grade class at the start of the 1963-1964 school year. He was a bus rider, along with me, John Kotlarczyk, Beth Nierman, and a slew of other kids. Bus riders were the minority at Oxford School. We all lived west of Telegraph Rd. and north of Michigan Ave. Later, we’d be known as “cake eaters,” referring to the fact that some of our dads were professional or white collar workers. Some of us had books in our homes, even magazine subscriptions. Some of us even had encyclopedias, the kind you bought one volume at a time from A&P.

The kids who lived southeast of the US 24-US 12 intersection constituted the majority of Oxford kids. Later on we’d call them greasers, referring to the hair and high Cuban heel shoes some of them wore. For all we knew, some of them had A&P encyclopedias too. Anyhow, Jeff Biggers, though he could often be a jerk, was one of the funniest kids I ever knew. You’d see some stupid TV commercial one day, and the next you’d hear Jeff doing a hilarious word for word parody. So one day you see the toy ad where the kid is on the walkie talkie saying, “Hello headquarters? Just wrecked my truck!” And the following day Jeff would be like, “Hello headquarters? Just wrecked my pants!” I once heard him parody an entire episode of Johnny Quest. He was South Park 30 years ahead of its time.

The one time I ran away from home, I ended up at Jeff’s house. It was probably the summer between 4th and 5th grade. There had been some kind of horseplay going on in my basement involving my brother, sister, and my sister’s boyfriend. A lamp got broke and it wasn’t entirely my fault. But I got sent to my room. Pissed, I snuck out the back door, hopped the back fence, and suddenly realizing I had nowhere to go, ran two blocks over to Jeff’s. It was past dusk. I just showed up at his side door and yelled “Je-e-eff,” stretching out to three sing-song syllables the way we always called on each other. He let me in and we sat in his basement watching Johnny Quest.

After half an hour I realized I might be in trouble. I said “seeya” and began slowly walking home, down Fairway Dr. and around the corner on to Cambridge St. As I walked past Beth Nierman’s house, a station wagon slowly approached and I quickly recognized my mom and dad in the front seat. I stood there like a porch jockey. They parked, and my dad got out, came around, opened the back door, and kicked my ass in such a way as to clearly signify that I was to get in the back seat.

That may have been the last time my dad ever used physical punishment on me. There was one other time later on that he wanted to. I don’t remember what I did, probably mouthed off to him, as was my wont, and he chased me down into the basement. I knew what was coming and I didn’t want it. I saw a large mailing tube, grabbed it as if it were a battering ram, and pointed it right at my dad. He stopped suddenly and almost laughed. I mean, it was just a mailing tube that he could easily have snatched away before lowering the boom. I guess that was the moment he realized I was too big to spank.

Now, I’m gonna get back to Jeff in a moment. But first, I need to explain a little more about fighting and why it was so hard for me. When I first started having to fight at school, my dad took great pains to try to teach me the value and technique of self defense. He’d show me how to punch six ways to Saturday. My mom, too, would implore me to defend myself and never to let anyone push me around. But my problem was that I couldn’t bear the idea of hitting anyone in the face. I had punched a couple of skinny kids in the stomach before, but found the stomach punch to be of little use when up against a kid of real heft.

So, I took a lot of bruising from Sam and one or two other stocky kids who used to push me around. But the day came when Jeff and a couple of older guys started giving me a lot of crap. Jeff, the funniest kid I ever met, turned his full range of smart ass sarcasm on me. It continued for the entire next day of school until we finally decided to settle matters behind my garage at 4:00. I might take a lot of crap from some kids, but I figured I couldn’t live with myself if I kept taking it from Jeff. So, I went straight home after school and caught my dad just as he was about to leave for his afternoon shift at Ford’s.

I leveled with him. “Dad, I don’t like to fight. I don’t like to hit. And Jeff’s my friend.”

“Rog,” he said, “there’ve been a lot of guys who said they were my friend, but….”

My dad was never afraid to fight. I saw him in action a few times, at a gas station, the bowling alley, Tiger Stadium. He told amazing stories about some of the fights he had when he was young. He was always standing up for his rights. “Stand up for your rights!” he’d tell me.

“Rog, there was this one time at the bowling alley when a guy who said he was my friend started saying bad stuff about me. Friend or not, I met him outside and popped him one!”

He continued. “Here’s what you do. When he comes over, you follow him out behind the garage. And just as he’s turning around, you lay one on his jaw.”

It sounded so simple. Why had I never thought of this?

About 10 minutes later, Jeff came to the back door. He had a smirk on his face as we walked to the back of the yard. Behind the garage, he still had the smirk as he turned around, and just as he did, my fist hit him square in the jaw. It felt really good. Jeff was clearly annoyed by this. I guess he never expected it. We boxed around for a few more minutes until my dad came back and broke it up.

The next day at school, Jeff was all, “he sucker punched me!” But no one really paid any attention. What mattered to me was the sense of justice I felt having popped him one. Never fear; Jeff and I stayed pretty much pals after that.

The last punch I threw was in 1987 at the age of 33. It was self defense. If I had to, I could do it again.

Next time: Devil’s Night