Mistakes and Misinterperations

Posted by: Triddle

Mistakes and Misinterperations - 07/28/06 06:58 AM

I know this isn't the place for 'highschool problems' but this isn't a story of a fight so much as an insight on interpreration, I thought someone might find it interesting... Besides, it happened at a college, not a highschool :P

Today at college a guy, nice enough fella, funny, came up to me and my mates and stole our jackets (which were on the ground) they contained our phones, and other valuables, he ran off laughing, me and a rather large... behemoth friend of mine chased after him, after a while he dropped the jackets running off laughing, no harm done.
My large friends phone wasn't in the jacket, so after returning the other guys jackets, we went looking for 'bob'

This is where I make my mistake, which causes some major misinterperation, I'll tell you my point of view, and my supposed version of his...
Mine:
I went around behind him, grabbing him, in order to steal the phone (Ok, so I'm an idiot...) this kind of 'play' is fairly common around me and my mates, but obviously not for bob, he turns around, grabbing my throat, very hard, confused by this, I took him to the asphelt ground, placing my hand behind him to ease his fall, this resulted in a minor graze to my hand, my friend comes over, he kneels by us, and asks about his phone, I'm not sure what the answer was, I wasn't listening, but he got it back... we got up, and walked away, confused at how my actions, which to me seemed friendly enough, had resulted in that...

now for what I'm assuming his view was like...
He sees me and my friend coming towards him, (hell, maybe he was even about to give us the phone) see me go round his back, and I grab him... I suppose hes thinking "what the...." or something like that, turns to defend himself, grabing my throat, ends up on the ground, and my friend comes over.

Hes angry, very angry, angry at me for my cowardly attempt to beat him up, when I next see him, hes barging into my class yelling and swearing at me, teacher turns him around, walks him out the door and closes the door before I manage to reply.

Later, I found out its his BIRTHDAY! now that made me feel bad... even though I hadn't meant anything like this to happen, was just gunna steal the phone and run off, all part of the game to me, and I made sure not to hurt him, just the fact that I upset him that much makes me feel pretty bad.... thinking back on it now I really should have said something after he stoped choking me instead of walking away, but I was kinda confused and not really thinking.

I have a problem now though, the poor fella thinks i was trying to beat him up from behind, and hes bloody angry, cant really blame him either, stupid of me not to sort things out straight away. Now I'm gunna have to try to talk to him on Monday...

Has anyone else had a similar experience? I feel really stupid for not realising that he might take that as threatening before I did it. I suppose I'm just lucky he didnt start throwing punches... then things could have gotten bad, and all because of his misinterperation of my stupid mistake. Kinda funny thinking about it now
Posted by: Gavin

Re: Mistakes and Misinterperations - 07/28/06 07:36 AM

Trouble with horse play amongst "the boys" is it is very easy for things to be misunderstoood. Side effect of our fragile ego's most of the time and can often lead to offence being taken when none was intended. Nothing to feel to bad about mate, doesn't sound like any long lasting damage was done. Have a chat with the guy explain the situation and wish him a happy birthday... give it a week and you'll have forgotten albout it!
Posted by: JoelM

Re: Mistakes and Misinterperations - 07/28/06 09:32 AM

Were any words exchanged when you went up to him to retrieve the cell phone? From the way you put it it sounds like you just walked up and attacked him. That's assault buddy.
Try using words instead of actions next time.
Posted by: Triddle

Re: Mistakes and Misinterperations - 07/28/06 05:46 PM

JoelM... Its true, it would have been smarter to just ask for it back, but it was a play thing, he stole the jackets and phones in play, so that was the appropriate way to take them back... or so it seemed. It wasnt an attempt to hurt him, and I did nothing to hurt him, its the kind of thing that happens all the time down here throughout schools and colleges and what not, maybe he was just feeling edgy, or maybe we're getting too old for that kind of thing... but then I think we would also be too old to nick peoples stuff and run off. To me it was sort of like he initiated a game in stealing our stuff, and we decided to play by chasing him, grabbing him (across the chest from behind) was to stop him running away while i nicked the phone. But I suppose the game was over for him, maybe the phone was just dropped, I'll have to ask my mate.

Anyway, thanks for the replies
Posted by: Mr_Heretik

Re: Mistakes and Misinterperations - 07/30/06 10:17 PM

I'm with Joel on this one..no words were exchanged? Thats really weird...