Battle Royal
by Doug Dawson
I remember how
Columbia Mall was in 1979 - like a butterfly
emerging from a cocoon. It consisted of one two-story
corridor, with a tiny food court in the middle
that would seat maybe twenty people. There were
two anchor stores - Hecht on one end and Woodward
and Lothrop on the other. Most of the mall's real
estate was filled by the parking lots, whose size
made the whole place look like a sea of empty
parking spaces around a small island.
Nowadays as you approach the mall on Little
Patuxent Parkway from the east you face Nordstrom,
Macy's and Lord and Taylor, and that's just on
one side. In the back the parking lots have given
way to an outdoor restaurant theme park and a
multiplex movie theatre. On the inside the
original corridor is just part of a labyrinth
that requires the better part of an hour just to
do a once-by all the stores. The place has become
upscale, a word that once didn't seem to fit into
the Baltimore-area lexicon. Then again, Columbia,
MD, to some people's thinking, belongs to
Washington, D.C. as much as it does to Baltimore.
Whatever it is and however upscale it is, one
doesn't walk in expecting to watch a battle right
in front of one's eyes.
I grew up watching fights; more socially
acceptable back then, it seems in hindsight. Kids
duked it out at school, siblings duked it out at
home and if all that wasn't enough there were the
Friday Night Fights and Saturday Night Fights on
TV, as Gillette Blue Blades admonished us to
"Look sharp, feel sharp and be sharp!"
In the late 1960's, fresh from a day at school, I’d
turn on the TV, just to find out what a real
fight was, as U.S. soldiers battled it out with
the Viet Cong in Vietnam. The political fights
made their way into the papers and I couldn’t
escape the wars of words, as parents hacked away
at each other verbally and neighbors went at it
over the fences. There was even this couple on
our party telephone line, who tortured each other
with "This is the end!" and "There
is no more (sob)." As I listened in and
choked back a tear for the love that must once
have been, as I wondered why all living things,
great and small, seem to fight - I mean why can't
we all just get along?
Fast-forward to around noon on a sunny day on
January. I was walking around Columbia Mall,
enjoying a Pina Colada Smoothie and trying to see
everything there was to see in the better part of
an hour. I was on the second floor, between the
Sears and J.C. Penney when I heard it - inside
one of the stores, two battlers going at it. I
walked into the store and could see that they
were both quite young - babies by my aging "boomer"
standards. One of the fighters was, shall we say
for political correctness, a “person of
color” and he was on the bottom, getting the
worst of it from an angry-appearing aggressor of
about the same age and who was of the “white
persuasion,” or a “person of white,”
if you prefer. I could see it was a mismatch and
was tempted to go get help; I mean you don't want
to watch anyone take a beating like this and
somebody who was really looking for it might have
found a racial component in that fight. That said,
contests often have a momentum, a force, a logic
of their own, like in a football game, when the
side that has it seems to sweep the field and
score most of the points. Well the darker
youngster I referred to must have decided to
snatch said momentum out of thin air, for I had
to avert my eyes from the mayhem for a few
seconds and when I looked back the combatants had
reversed roles, with the darker fighter now on
top, firmly in command, raising a ruckus and
inflicting some damage of his own.
I certainly wasn't the only witness and the other
viewers pointed, laughed and even shouted
encouragement. I was about to tell those people
in no uncertain terms that their approval of this
spectacle was offensive to me when the fight
entered its final and, I suppose, most dangerous
phase. There already had been lots of noise,
kicking and gouging, but now the volume level
reached screeching proportions as the darker
fighter, now on top, bit the ear of his lighter
opponent and managed to get one of his feet on
his enemy's face and started kicking him
mercilessly. I was about to run and get one of
the mall's security guards when the manager of
the store showed up.
He shook his head at the mayhem then loudly said
"All right, you two - that's enough!"
Before I could spit, it was all over. The
fighters must have realized the error of their
ways, for they just laid there looking up when
the manager reached into the cage and grabbed one
of his two errant charges, a tiny short-haired,
black-and-tan miniature male Dachshund, who was
promptly carried to one of the store's little
rooms and set on the floor so customers could
enter the room and play with him. As his cage
companion and recent antagonist was carried away,
the tiny white "Westy" - that's West
Highland White Terrier, to you - looked like he
already missed his cell mate. He didn't seem any
worse for all the wear.
Now before you tell me I overreacted and that the
whole business was "strictly small potatoes,"
let me tell you that to me dogs aren't just pets,
they're little people. And while we're at it I'll
thank you not to refer to Dachshunds as "wieners"
or "hot dogs." They are pure-breeds and
they've got a style, a look, a sort of dignity
and – dare I say it – a panache of
their own. After standing there watching for so
long I couldn't leave without playing with one,
so I asked to see the little Dachshund and the
manager of the Today's Pet store kindly obliged
me. I played with the pup for quite a while and
in spite of everything I've said I can usually go
into a pet store without getting too emotionally
involved, but something about the way that little
guy looked up at me ... let's just say he got to
me. He was ... how do I put this ... so damned
loveable I almost hated him for it. I mean, who
the hell is he to wrap me around his little paw?
And that should have been the end of this story -
but wait! Another fight was brewing, for into the
pet store rushed a militant, a crusader for the
cause of pet liberty, a middle-aged woman who
promptly tore into the store’s employees and
manager in turn, expressing her umbrage at the
idea of keeping the output of “puppy mills”
in hideous little cages – a clear abuse of
animal rights. Apparently, this woman didn’t
want to settle anything with her loud rant, but
only to let off some steam at the store’s
employees, while managing to strike a blow for
the cause, so to speak. At any rate she was gone
before mall security arrived, ending that brawl.
Now I had three things to think about: two little
dogs and a cause. I walked out of there proud of
myself; I remained strong and I hadn't given in
and bought a dog, despite considerable sales
pressure. Now, a day later, I remain a tower of
strength, an emotional block of granite that can't
be swayed by man or beast, but - I tell you this
in strict confidence - after playing with that
little fellow I'm weakening, and, so help me
– I think I’ll go back there and buy
the little dachshund puppy tomorrow.
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