He was just some dopey kid who lived in the house across the street and one house over from the house where I grew up in Omaha. I don’t even remember his name. On one of those countless golden afternoons of my childhood, I think I was seven, this kid took it upon himself to terrorize every other small kid on the street by turning on his front garden hose and spraying unsuspecting kids as they came around the corner onto our street.

He didn’t do this in a fun way, he did it in a mean way. And the two young siblings who lived further down the street were clearly upset as they went crying back to their house after getting drenched.

I walked out of my front yard and walked up the kid’s driveway. I didn’t have a plan.

But there was one idea that I held fixed before me as I got within firing range. “This kid cannot hurt me.”

I stopped in his driveway with my hands on my hips. I said nothing. I just stared him down.

He fired at point blank range at the center of my chest. In a moment I was soaked through. I kept standing there staring at him. I only wanted to let him know,”I am not afraid of you. This is only water. You do not scare me. Just because you have a hose, you think you can scare other kids, but it will not work with me.”

He kept firing, and it became a battle of wills. How long would he continue to spray me to no effect? How long would I stand there getting soaked? I remember standing there for a long time. Who would give in first?

“I am not afraid of you. I can take anything you can dish out. I will not move. I will not move. I will not be intimidated by you.”

I suddenly heard my mother call my name from across the street.

But I did not move. I would not let this kid see me back down and turn away from him.

My mother called again and more insistantly.

I did not move.

My mother angrily crossed the street towards me and as she did so, the kid dropped the hose and ran.

My mother grabbed me by the elbow and marched me back to the house while yelling...

“Just what do you think you were doing? Don’t you have any more sense than to just stand there and get wet? Get in the bathroom right now, young man.” And so on. Her angry lecture did not stop as I leaned against the bathtub and she pulled my soaking wet shirt off of me.

But truthfully, I don’t actually remember anything she said. I looked down at the puddle on the bathroom floor and smiled uncontrollably.