A Lesson From an Angry Man

I began my day as usual today and was arriving at the Skytrain station when I was greeted by the acrid stench of cigarette smoke. There was a crusty older guy smoking his way up the escalator onto the platform.

So I approached him on the miniscule off-chance that he didn't know that he wasn't allowed to smoke there. My polite "Excuse me but you're not allowed to smoke up here" was met with his "I don't really give a fuck".

Well I wasn't really expecting any other response from him but had felt obligated to at least try. I said "Ah, ignorance first thing in the morning. My favorite" to which he replied "Mind you own fucking business". At this point I should have stopped but my blood was going at this point (probably his intention) so I said "It is my business because I have to smell it". He replied with some more swearing (I stopped listening at this point) and took a few steps towards me. The train had arrived so I grimaced at him in disgust, waved my hand at him and entered the car his wasn't going to be in.

Now, at this point I was pretty angry, being sweared at by someone at 7am tends to do that. But since I wasn't expecting anything other than what I got, I began to wonder why I was upset.

The answer was fairly quick in coming. My ego was having trouble with letting him win. It wanted to yell at him and indulge in the same sort of ignorant animalistic behaviour he was. I wanted to bump chests and throw a punch, anything but let him continue to smoke while I walked away. Having recognized this, it was easy to see that he wasn't really winning, since his base morally corrupt existence was only perpetuated by this display of do-whatever-the-hell-I-want behaviour. Either that or he was just having a bad day but something told me that this was this guy's MO.

But I was still pissed. I couldn't find the other side of his story and through it find my compassion for him. I couldn't find a way to let it go. It haunted me all the way to the gym and throughout my workout.

But as I was walking back down to the bus stop to finish my trip to work I looked up. The street I was on was lined with big tall trees with widespread branches that created a vibrant green canopy over me. The wind was blowing and the leaves were rustling and I was again reminded on the beauty that surrounds us. Nature was singing to me with her soft voice.

And then I found it.

Careful to not make judgements, I realized that he was most likely an angry man, as I once was. And angry men are really just frightened men who decide that the best defense is an offense. Any confrontation, any contradiction must be met head on with force and abuse. It is how he sees the world had always dealt with him. He is lost in a world he doesn't understand with no way of finding help and no ability to accept a better way. Been there, done that. Through my similar experiences and my own self discovery I could begin to see what would drive him to behave this way.

And so I let it go.