Most of you have heard the saying, "It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog." I can easily testify to that! Let me give you an example from my own life:
Nightclubs always like to start new bouncers off on busy nights, usually Friday or Saturday. It’s sort of a trial-by-fire attitude. And I think it was a Friday that I found my young-self on my first night at a Deja Vu Gentleman's Club. Dressed in black slacks and an over-sized wrinkled white dress shirt (which they’d let me borrow) as I was being 'shown the ropes' of strip club bouncing.
I had done some teenage dance club stuff over the previous year but I was still so very naïve and never even been into a place like this. This place was simply, a Porn Palace- brass mirrored high-rise ceilings reflecting swirling and strobing lights across two floors with 3 stages. Over 100 nude dancers in clear stilettos prowling like purring cats in every dark corner of a spiraling complex that could easily hold a thousand drunk and shouting lust-enraged men. And this place was packed! I could hardly see across the bass-pounding, smoke-filled room.
And I guess it was around midnight when the very large, well dressed and dangerously acute manager of the club approached me. And with complete control while staring intently down at his clipboard of girls names he took the cigar from his mouth and said in a deep and commanding voice, “There’s two guys on a VIP couch over by the DJ booth. They can’t sit there. Tell them to move.”
And in my own young, tall, twitchy, and over-caffeinated way I shouted back, “Yes Sir!” and headed to the couch area. Once there I rolled my shoulders back, put on a smile and said with all politeness something to the effect of, “Hey guys, can I help you find a different seat?” when one of them sharply interrupted me saying, “No A**hole, you can find us a couple b*tches to come party with us.”
I wasn’t ready for this. I was almost frozen by it. I was use to teenagers with glitter and small backpacks who listened to ABBA played at high-speed as they danced through a dozen overpriced bottles of water. This was something totally different. These guys looked like Marines straight from boot camp who couldn't wait to get deployed anywhere violent.
Frankly, I was scared. But I wasn’t going to tuck and run that easily so I tried again by smiling nervously and saying, “I’m sorry guys, I was just sent to tell you that you can’t sit here.” And you’d think by the expression that suddenly came over both their faces as they turned to stare directly through me that I’d just told these guys I’d ran over their mother.
A bloodshot rage lit up in their eyes that started my whole body shaking as the larger of the two muscle-pulsing men sat up rigidly and slid to the edge of the couch and challengingly said, “Why don’t you go ahead and move us then.”
I could tell right away these guys were ready to brawl and that’s the last thing I wanted. So now being completely off guard and trembling like a leaf I went back to the manager and started to explain by saying, “Sir, I think we have a problem…” But he cut me off too and shouted, “No pencil-neck, we don’t have a problem! You have a problem! Get those two guys outta my club or you can get out of my club and never come back!” Then he plugged the cigar back into his mouth and continued writing on his clipboard as though I wasn’t even there.
I had to make a decision. How bad did I need this job? How much was this job worth to me? I knew I was flat broke and starving. I was new to town and had spent the last month sleeping on the floor of a friend’s basement apartment. In fact, I had to walk almost 5 miles just to get there that night and would have to walk the same 5 miles back at whatever late hour I got off. I’m not even sure if I had eaten anything other than a couple sugar packets from the bar. No, there was no other option. I needed this job bad.
So with a mocking smile and an screw-it attitude I said back to the manager, “Oh I know its my problem. I was just letting you know so when you see chairs and tables flying out of that area, you wouldn’t worry cause that’s just me laying down the law!” To which he chucked a little then soberly said, “Get going Sherriff.”
I turned on my heal and walked back toward the couches. Then stopping to think clearly at the last minute I ducked into the nearby glass DJ both. The DJ had met me earlier and wasn’t impressed by my puny size so now he hardly bothered to look at me as he went on digging through his collection of CD’s. I didn’t look at him either as I took off my clip-on tie and started unbuttoning my dress shirt. Then as I pulled the shirt off my shoulders and began folding it neatly the DJ finally glanced over with an annoyed expression and said, "What are you doing?"
And with my voice trembling as I laid the folded shirt down I said with all honesty, "I might not win this fight and I can't afford to pay for this shirt after I've bled all over it." Then without looking back, I walked out of the booth and toward the two men.
They’d both been laughing with one another thinking I had given up when one nudged the other and pointed to me now standing in front of them with trembling spaghetti arms in my pit-stained tank-top. I clenched both hands into the tightest fists I could make and quickly said, “You want to do this one at a time or all together?”
Now, the look on their faces was priceless; just complete bewilderment. For almost whole minute they just stared in silence at this pathetic, boney kid standing like a prisoner before a firing squad ready to go down swinging at the bullets. Then they looked at each other and began laughing. Suddenly one of them bolted to his feet quicker than I could blink and with his nose almost pressed into mine as he breathed on my face he said, “We were just leaving anyway.”
Then they both stared coldly at me as they slowly grabbed their coats. And as they passed by, the second one gave me a shove with one hand that sent me tumbling completely back over their table as the two of them laughed again and left for the night.
Now gathering myself together as quickly as I could and cleaning up the ashtrays and glasses I had knocked over, I went back over to the manager to see if I still had a job. The manager stared at me with the same bewildered expression those two guys had. “There gone sir” I reported with eyes wide open in my own shock. Finally his eyes dropped back down to his clipboard as he sighed and said “So what, get back to work.” “Yes sir” I answered.
And as I turned back toward the DJ booth the Manager yelled out one last time, “Hey Poindexter! Only girls get naked here. Got it?” “Yes sir” I said again with a little smile as I hurried to get dressed and keep working.
So my point is this- The fight in the dog can definitely determine the outcome. But not always the way you might think. To me at least, it really comes down to the hunger. How hungry is this dog? Is he starving? Is he small and wasted to nothing? Just thin skin and sharp bones as his fragile frame prowls whichever junkyard he’s in? Is he cold and wirery? Would he attack something twice his size just for one chance to sink his teeth into anything warm?
Because to me that’s how we need to live. If we hope to get through this life without surrendering into some self-induce overly sedated coma of existence, we’re going to need to start letting ourselves starve a little. Let’s test our faith to get the flavor back. Get out of our emotional comfort zones. Stretch our goals, take our chances. Let’s get a little desperate and even delirious with a passion that makes you sweat.
Because we should always get a little twitchy about where our hearts lead us. About what we love- What we need. Not resting in what we have. Not settling for what we get. But like when we were young, alone, cold, and starving- Let’s all get back to that stripped down, bare-boned, junkyard faith that’s always willing to fight as though our next meal depended on the outcome.
To me at least, for all its outward flaws that’s still a life worth living.
"For if anyone thinks he is something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself. But let each one test his own work, and then his reason to boast will be in himself alone and not in his neighbor. For each will have to bear his own load."
-Galatians 6:3-5
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