It takes cojones the size of watermelons to turn and walk away from a fight. Particularly if you know you can kick the other guy's a$$.
On the other hand, if I'm hit first...
Here's a story. About a lady. Raising 3 very lovely girls.
(oh, wrong story)
I was at a house party with a bunch of friends. There was one guy who was always the butt of everybody's jokes. (Every group has one..) But he was a good friend. There was also the bully of the group. Liked pushing people around. (I ended up stealing his girlfriend and marrying her! Hah!) Over the course of the night, the bully's jabs at the butt (sounds disgusting) were getting really mean and nasty instead of the normal good natured ribbing we usually give him. I finally turned and layed my wit on the bully because I was sick of his sh!t. He couldn't handle getting zinged repeatedly like I'm VERY capable of doing. So I'm sitting on the couch, drink in hand, and this bastard cold cocks me. First instinct was to jump up and kick his a$$. But it was a friend's house, so rather than take a chance on smashing up his nice furniture, I let the punch go. I warned him that was his one freebie. (Note, that I was a skinny blonde kid and he was a good 3 times my size, and not all fat either.) He thought that was funny, and went on ribbing the other guy. So I layed into him with a vengance. I turned to talk to the guy next to me and WHAM. Another cold cock.
No more freebies. Grabbed my freshly opened beer bottle and thwapped him upside the head. Burst his eyeball and everything. It was a beautiful sight. He dove for me and I jumped across the coffee table, and he went face first into the couch. (I said he was big, not quick.) By the time he was up I had my jacket off and was ready to brawl, but the other guys started beating on the guy. They couldn't believe I had let the first punch go and wanted to kick his a$$ themselves for his attitude and for starting crap in this friend's pad. I grabbed a fresh beer, apologized for the spills, and everybody had a good laugh.
Bully was outside bitching and moaning about how unfair it all was.
The moral of that story is that I let the first one go. That took all my willpower to do the right thing. But the right thing it was. I felt better for doing that than for taking him on. Though seeing him weeks later with his eye still full of blood was pretty damn cool.
