At about 4:30 in the morning during Saturday morning, December 21st, 2002, a friend and I were running out after some minor partying for him to get a pack of cigarettes. There was absolutely no one on the road, and it was a bizarre feeling, seeing everything all lit up but no cars passing alongside us. We went to the gas station right by my house, where he was shocked to find they were closed, thinking that he had been there before at this time and that they were open twenty-four hours. So, deciding that he still wanted a pack of cigarettes, we ended up going out the main drag in pursuit of this elusive gas station that was still open at that hour.

A little bit down the road, we find a Superamerica (a regional gas station) open, with a nondescript car idling in front of the station itself We didn�t think anything about it, and parked the van alongside the gas station. Walking up, starting to enter the gas station, the person in shotgun starts calling me and my buddy a number of names. Again, this is not realy something that is odd to either of us, as I have been called different names for a number of years, and I�m sure my friend has too. We enter, not wanting to make anything of it, and I walk over to get some Code Red. My friend goes to the restroom, and every single noise that I hear literally makes me jump about five feet in the air. My friend finally comes out of the bathroom, and we shop around for a minute, noticing that the car has since pulled out of the space that it had once occupied and parked itself next to the van. I started to get a little more worried, as I had just assumed that the people in the car would get bored with us after staying in the gas station for ten minutes, but this was 4:30 in the morning. I should have realized that they really didn't have much to do besides heckle some punk kids in a van. We were assured by the cashier working the desk that the people in the car that had messed with us before were her friends, and they wouldn't do anything to us. She was completely and utterly wrong.

We depart the gas station, believe in what the cashier said, and started to get into the van, when again, the passenger window comes down and we start getting called names again. My friend, trying to be a mellow guy, starts getting into the van even with various things being thrown at us and being spit on. He starts packing his cigarettes with his hand when the driver of the other car gets up from his seat and looks at us from the outside of the van, practically shattering the driver's side window when he smacks it, trying to get our attention. He even goes so far as to open up the van's door and starts to yell at us. The guy finally stopped after he hit my friend in the head, realizing that we weren�t going to put up with much more of his crap.

Throughout this whole encounter, I felt distanced from reality. I kept thinking about the piece I had written for this issue about those rut-creating life decisions that I had made in the past, and how there were two very distinct courses of actions for me to take. From the story, one was obviously that I stay mellow and not do anything but listen to the taunts and yells. I could have also took matters into my own hands, and fought alongside my friend. Luckily, my friend also made a good decision that night, not bothering to use the crowbar he had placed in his van for just such an occasion. I just know if he would have used that tool that night, I would not be writing this as we speak. While my friend does not completely share this idea of rut-inducing incidents in life, he believes in luck, and believes that one time or another, his luck would run out.

Being a Wiccan/Pagan, I believe in the three fold rule. This is to say, that any thing that I do, good or bad, is reflected on me three times. Those two major life choices were examples of me doing horrible things, and being repaid with horrible things that were magnifications of my bad actions. Regardless of whoever might have started that fight, if it had happened, I believe that the three fold rule would have been invoked on me, and I would currently be in extremely hot water with the police as we speak. I don't have that type of luck to actually avoid charges like that. Each of my two prior infractions were contained relatively well at the High School. If there was a third time last night, there would be no high school to save me, and it would be all my fault. I believe that the third event would have created a rut that would have wrecked any chances of mine to escape the black hole we call Lancaster, and forced me to never achieve any of my dreams.

We left the gas station after they had left, not in pursuit, but just to get back to my house and cool down. I feel that we did the right thing that night, and avoided a potentially dangerous situation by using the same tactics that such great individuals as Martin Luther King, Jr and the numerous youths that sat in at lunch counters demanding integration. While this occurrence was not politically motivated in any way, we refused to let ourselves be forced into a lower form of action. Regardless of what any other party believes, and regardless of the fact that we did not lay one hand on our assailants, we were the victors. We used our brains, instead of our brawn ; we kept our cool, instead of acting on base emotion.