I had this shocking experience which I’d like to share but before I do, it would help your understanding a bit if explained a biological term.
Mimicry is a phenomenon where certain harmless animals may closely resemble badass ones. This could be adaptive and as a result, predators of the mimics cannot distinguish the copycats from the real McCoy and therefore are often left well alone. This is called Batesian mimicry. In other words, this wuss of an animal wears a camouflage that makes it look like a wildlife version of Chuck Norris. The luckless chap who’d have made lunch out of him, would take a look at him, shake his head and mutter to himself, ”I think I’ll try McDonald’s” .
Okay, back to our regular scheduled program. I happen to be a good example of a Batesian mimic. To support my claim, here are the main points:
· I applied for a role as an extra in the movie, “Planet of the Apes” (not the human cast) and the cast director turned me down on the grounds that he “didn’t want the shit to look too real. Hell, I’m going for a PG-13 here”.
· Mothers have crossed the road with their kids when I’m the oncoming traffic. For the same reason, I do not visit houses with under two-year children.
· Bus conductors (arguably the roughest guys in the labor force) never give me change trouble. WTF, sometimes they overpay me!
· I have had people stare at my picture wondering why there is no chain-link fence in the foreground. They mostly conclude it must be an open safari picture of a gorilla.
But really I’m basically your mild-mannered, goody-two shoes Mr. Nice Guy and rarely give people trouble.
I recently sold something (don’t ask me what) to someone (don’t ask me who, either) an obnoxious five foot, squeaky-voiced, squint-eyed and gabby asswipe who returned with complaints concerning the state of the goods I sold him. He seemed not to understand the meaning of the phrase caveat emptor which was not in the least surprising because he talked so fast it seemed his brain had no part in whatever communication we were having; it was a reflex response. I tried in my best placatory voice to ask him to leave my office and enjoy his purchase as best as he could but he got more abusive with the most colorful words I’ve ever heard. I mean, we are talking rainbow colors here! What was more disconcerting was that one of his eyes was staring at me and the other was staring at my certificate (my crazy certification, for those of you who don’t already know) hanging 3 feet west from the position behind me and this was freaking me out a little bit. Now a voice like Alvin and the Chipmunks + squint eye + Twista rap = a case of migraine. I just couldn’t take it anymore. I took a step towards him with a vicious snarl on my face and raised my hand as if to strike him. I had the no idea of what happened next but in the second it took me to blink my eye, he had disappeared. The only thing that reminded me of his earlier presence was the throbbing headache he forgot to take with him.
I also made a mental note to put this up.
I believed that was the last I would hear from him and heaved a sigh of relief. That was a little premature. As I was hunched over my desk, doodling on a piece of paper (my little altercation with Pipsqueak Squint-eye still had me piqued and I couldn’t concentrate on my work) a shadow fell on my desk and caused me to look up.
Standing in front of me was a hulk. Well, at least not the Incredible Hulk; that would have scared me shitless. As it were, I still had my shit together. Here was this seven foot one, tank-chested dude with a face that put new challenges to the word rugged. He looked like a model for Extreme Bodybuilding Today. He was slowly chewing something which my first thought was that that was the balls of some idiot who made the mistake of standing in his way. I looked mean but comparing me to him is more like a contrast; it was comparing your garden variety gorilla to King-Kong or mighty Joe Young, comparing Yoda to Incredible Hulk (yeah, both of them are green but that is where the likeness ends). There was also was also a thick vapor of testosterone in the room that I was expecting hormone showers. He was a shade of black akin to Noob Saibot’s. I had a name for him: Mean Sonofabitch. It also spelled trouble.
Standing beside him, fuming in anger and slowly working his way up to a coronary was Pipsqueak. He kept his distance, though, remaining attached to Mr. Mean Sonofabitch (small consolation). I googled double trouble: this situation ranked number one in the results.
I swallowed and hoped it wasn’t audible. I cleared my throat. “Can I help you?” I asked Mr. Mean while favoring Pipsqueak with an unpleasant glare.
“Help me?” he shrieked. “I am yet to survive your earlier ‘help’ and you are still offering me more. Is your name Shylock?”
“Excuse me but this is hardly—” I began but I was quickly cut off by Mr. Pip who lapsed into a fit of abuses meant for my consumption.
“Look at this shameless advertisement of an asshole...” He spat his words in my face. Now he was within a two foot radius of my face and was generously favoring me with a sample of his peculiar mouthwash. Early Morning Unwashed™ with a dash of Organic Putrefaction™. His harangue also involved baptism of my face with spittle. I had this barely uncontrollable urge to throttle him.
“There is no need to—”
Another salvo of fresh abuse and spittle flew into my face. Pipsqueak was now gesticulating wildly and getting worked up. I was then seriously considering homicide but was held back by this hulk beside me. Through all this he just stood there arms folded across his chest , chewing whatever it was and watched us with a kind of cool and distracted mien. For this reason I could not yet accurately assign a value to the threat level of Mr. Mean.
The verbal attack, the olfactory assault (from Pip’s mouth, ahem, fragrance), the liquid pieces of DNA which I was being baptized with (I wasn’t even Catholic to begin with) and the potential physical threat from Mr. Mean was taking a toll on my chi. I was now a bundle of nerves a hair breath away from snapping.
Pipsqueak rushed at me, I wonder for what reason, and Mr. Mean reached out and snapped him back like a Chihuahua on a leash. I swear he dangled in mid-air for about five seconds before he put him down. Then Mean spoke, “There is no need for you to exert yourself, man.” That was when I snapped.
You see, I snapped because when Mr. Mean spoke I expected to hear a human rendition of God giving the Ten Commandments but instead I heard this effeminate voice, kind of like Mariah Carey or a ball-less Michael Jackson.
What followed next was because of this. In nature, there is no instance where an animal looks, speaks or acts in a less threatening way. No animal has the right to look less harmful than it is. So a concrete-and-steel chunk of human ought not to sound like a helium-filled party balloon, right? Right?
Then I snapped. I rushed at Pipsqueak and swatted him with a vicious backhand that sent him ejaculating six feet outside the door. I leapt in air, threw my hands up and back over my head and plunged my open palms into Mr. Mean’s chest.
Normally, this move which I have field-tested and patented would launched a man into a five second air voyage or the nearest obstacle at 4 meters per second whichever comes first but this had not been tested on trees so I had no idea how it would impact Mean. My palms struck his chest with a sharp thwack! And I rebounded while he didn’t move an inch!
Uh-oh!
He gave me this look of almost rueful expression on his face, a kind of oh-why-did-you-have-to-do-something-so-foolish look. He raised his palm— roughly the size of my head— and set it on a trajectory on a collision course with my face. I didn’t feel the impact; all just went black.
I opened my eyes and it was night and I was lying on my bed. Wondering how I got there, I looked over at my bedside clock—7.30 pm— and the incident happened at about 5.45pm. I felt my head. There was nothing wrong. Not even a mild headache. In fact, I felt chipper. Mr. Mean’s punch didn’t pack much power, then, I thought as I got up. My sister barged into the room then looked over at me and said, “Glad you are still alive. I thought you’d kicked the container.”
“Yeah, for about 2 hours it felt like it.”
She gave me a funny look and said, “Yeah. Two hours and five days.”
What The F@*k!!
Two hours and five days! I was in a fucking coma! I had just experienced the Bitch-Slap Displacement of Time.
I hit my biology books harder and— Aha!—I found another type of mimicry: the Mertensian or Emsleyan. Here what happens is basically is a Jet Li in skirts and lipstick masking technique. The animal’s get-on screams, “Look at me! Look at me! I’m a wuss, a cry baby, an easy prey” and once the would-be predator is within striking distance, it grabs it by the neck and chokes it to death yelling, “Die, asshole! Die! There, that should teach you.” I have begun taking voice lessons to make it more effeminate while working on my combat skills. I’m also looking into dressing delicately, kinda like the Prince. You don’t need to be a Sherlock Holmes to figure out where I’m going with that.
