This next little story is about the Dudley family on a road trip to visit grandma, in Las Vegas. We were bringing a friend of my youngest son's on this trip and everyone was excited about it, mostly because the weather at home sucked and it was about 75 in Las Vegas.
Being respectful has become far more of a bigger deal to me as I've aged. I was raised and taught manners. Anyone older than me was either "sir" or "ma'am" and my vocabulary was full of "yes please" and "no thank you". To me, that is ground level respect and it is owed to people who are equally as respectful. I've had the incredible misfortune to have encountered some very less than respectful people. Some of them are, for lack of a better word, bullies.
We had been on the road for about 6 hours. It was time for another pit stop so we pulled off the interstate and into a gas station/convenience store. When it comes to these places, I am in and out. The wife and the kids like to look at all of the little trinkets and other tourist related crap on the shelves. So, as per usual, I run in, take a leak, grab a Mt. Dew and make it back out to the car.
I know it is going to be a good 10 minutes before the rest of the clan comes out, so I start to read the Thrifty Nickel want ads. I can't help but notice this large Ford SUV that pulled into the gas pumps directly behind me. The guy, for some reason made it a point to kind of race around the parking lot before pulling into the pumps. His crew unloads and starts in to the convenience store. The guy hollers to his wife, "bring me out something good".
In the mean time, this guy goes about filling the SUV full of fuel. My clan is coming out of the store so I fire up the vehicle and get ready to reembark. Just as I do this, the idiot in the SUV throws the hunk of shit in reverse and is bearing down on my family who have just stepped off the curb. My youngest son yells "Whoa!" I look and notice it was a close call, but no need to get worked up. All of a sudden I hear this jerk off yelling at my son. My son beckons for dear old dad... (Now, this is exactly the type of scenario that I love! Someone wants to fuck with the thing I love the most... my family.)
This clown starts towards my son, yelling profanity. As I step out of the car I yell, "Hey!" Without missing a step, numb nuts bows up his little bird chest and starts to walk towards me, until I stand all the way up. "Why don't you yell at me, mother fucker?" I say. "That kid is 14 and you were a second away from mowing over my family. You're problem isn't with him, tough guy. Its with me."
(I was fortunate enough in my bar career that when I meant business, it was somehow obvious. At this point in time, I was a few years removed from the bar business but it was obvious from the look on this assholes face that he was getting ready for a "come to Jesus" meeting with me. Apparently, I still had it.)
Now, my loving wife has seen this side of me. The kids and their friend? Not so much and Wade is pretty sure I am going to beat the ever loving shit out of this guy. What Wade, Roger and Ian didn't know is... I already had. This dude probably shit down both legs when he realized he was no longer fucking with a kid but dealing with his much larger, much more aggressive father.
Immediately, this guy begins to explain that he "wasn't really mad" at my kid, but "was startled by the yelling" or something... anything to distance himself from a potential ass whipping in front of his wife and kids, not to mention everyone else now looking at him and I. This is a tactic that bullies use when they know they are in deep kimchi. As he stumbles all over himself to get away from me (I'm not moving) he keeps mumbling, so I tell him to "get his sorry ass in the car and quit fucking with little kids". (I don't condone the use of profanity in front of kids, but sadly enough... I have been known to be a bit profane.)
So, numb nuts hops in his car as his family comes out of the store. I look at my clan. The wife kind of raises her eyebrows and realizes that she won't have to bail my ass out of jail in the middle of Utah. Both my boys and Ian are looking at me like, "Holy shit!".... the icing on the cake was they were all kind of smiling.
We are all back in the car and I can hear this idiot saying something to his wife, but its really unimportant right now. We back out of the spot and head towards the interstate to resume the "spring road trip". Now we are all kind of laughing about it. This guy was willing to get into a beef with a kid over his own dumbassedness (did I just make a new word?) until he realized his worst nightmare was this kids dad.
Now, back to respect and good manners. This whole thing could have turned out much different. My son could have said, "Pardon me, but it appears you have some pedestrians behind you and it would be extremely unsafe to continue until the pedestrians are clear." Then the kind gentleman could have said, "By gosh young lad. I am awful sorry for practicing unsafe backing. I didn't see you, your mother, your sibling and your friend. Therefore, I believe I owe the group of you an apology." At that point my son would have said, "Apology accepted my dear man. Please safely enjoy the rest of your day." And in closing, the gentleman would have said, "Tut Tut, old chap" and tipped his fucking hat to me..... because of him being an asshole, he got fed an asshole sandwich by one of the biggest assholes around... me!
What really gets me is this. How did this guy think that him backing up and almost running over my family was somehow my families fault? Fortunately enough, I was available to bring him around to my way of thinking... no blood shed, no hard feelings.
We continued to chuckle about that for a while. Both of my kids thought I was going to kill the guy. The wife, she wasn't 100% sure how it was going to turn out but she knew that I had a handle on the thing. A few miles down the road, old numb nuts and company are going to pass us. We are in the left lane chugging along at about 80 miles per hour. As he passes, he is as far left of me as he could be, without driving in the grassy median. He managed to have his turn signal on as he passed and was gracious enough to turn in back to the left when he decided it was safe to get back into the left lane (which was about 300 feet in front of me.)
Now, hopefully my kids and Ian came away from this situation with something. Treat people the way you expect to be treated and you're far more likely to be treated fairly in return. Not too sure my wife came away with anything from the situation, except a laugh and a goofy assed Dudley Family Memory.
Either way/both ways, I'm glad I was there to oblige everyone.
P.S.
What everyone thought was real funny is, we all know that the last thing this idiot expected was to see a large tattooed redneck to hop out of a Subaru. As my Japanese friends would say..."Supplies!"
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