Fight Night

I come from small town America where just about everyone hides behind a façade of some sort, and everyone seeks attention. My personal roots come from the “I’m tough” façade. No matter how fragile or scared I might have been in any given situation I grew up with a sense of always needing to protect myself. I wanted that protection to come from someone else, but instead I had to do it myself. The attention I wanted was not there and I needed to be tough. I loved watching boxing, wrestling, and roller derby. I loved how tough everyone was. I wanted to be that tough so I never feared not being able to protect myself. I loved the spectacle although it seemed like it was all on the edge of being out of control... Several months ago on one my many visits “back home” I met a young man named Zach Wood. I was immediately drawn to his “tough guy” façade. He seemed a bit lost and definitely on the edge of being out of control. Fight Night is a chapter out of a larger ongoing project titled “Lost in Mt. Vernon” in which Zach Wood is the protagonist. Zach is at one moment seemingly sensitive and caring, and at another he is brutally tough, attention seeking and a fighter. He starts to symbolize how I felt growing up. In society we may often draw attention to ourselves by the way we look or act. And, we also draw attention by engaging in activities that provide us opportunities for being in the spotlight. Fighting in my opinion is a loud call for attention and being tough maintains the façade. In this small community the theater of the fight night is a mix of interesting characters as the fighters as well as an odd mix of audience coming together to watch the sheer brutality of beating another person behind a fence. At one moment it’s appalling and at another moment exhilarating. It took me immediately back to watching TV as a kid, and wanting to be one of the tough people fighting whether in a boxing ring or on a skating oval. Boys fight other boys and girls fight other girls, but all together they are all fighting for the spotlight. Zach included. For me this symbolizes the fight to be noticed, and the fight to win a place in society.