“A fool gives full vent to his anger, but a wise man keeps himself under control.”
-Proverbs 29:11

I remember the first time I heard someone yell “FIGHT” not long after my first day in junior high. Everyone was rushing down the outdoor corridor, so I followed thinking some dogs must have gotten into a fight out by the school sign. Outside I was stunned to see two boys beating the stuffing out of each other while half of the school was circled around. I had just come out of a small private grade school, so I’d never seen anything quite like this before.

A few seconds after I got there, the fight abruptly ended when one boy’s glass eye popped out of the socket and landed in the dirt. That scene was so disturbing I ignored all future “FIGHT” battle cries.

There weren’t as many rumbles in high school, that I remember. Either hormones started leveling out or the fights were taken elsewhere. Or maybe a lot of the tension and aggression was taken out on the football field.

I don’t like to see people fight, even in movies. It probably goes back to my junior high experience. Or, it’s my inner hippie: “Why can’t we all get along.”

This week people have been testy. I saw a man yell at his wife in Marshall’s in front of his kids and a store full of people. I felt so sorry for the wife and kids. A couple was sitting in a truck outside the grocery store yelling at each other as loud as they could. I was embarrassed for them. Maybe when it’s not so hot people will calm down.

The other night Jim and I were in our favorite sushi restaurant in a little strip mall. I looked out the window to see a nicely dressed woman up in the face of another nicely dressed woman screaming at the top of her lungs. I instantly had a “FIGHT” flashback. They moved over in front of the Domino’s next door and evidently went after it. Domino’s employees broke it up. One of the women walked back in front of the sushi window putting her wig back on. All Jim and I could do was laugh.

As we were leaving, I asked one of the girls in a blue Domino’s shirt what the fight was all about. “One woman ordered a pizza the other one didn’t like. Important stuff, “ she grinned.

Maybe like the guys in junior high, their hormones were out of sorts. Or it might just be the heat. Cooler weather is on the way.