Pride goeth like a little girl screaming, but the lesson sticks

Maybe you've caught yourself saying something that starts with these words: "Oh, young people these days ... ."

And then you go on with something like: they don't know how to work, they're too soft, they're too chubby, they're too arrogant, they don't know nothing, they're always blah blah blah, until you sound like a cantankerous old fart.

Frankly, many statistics and much media coverage give weight to a lot of these complaints.

And who among the over-30 crowd can't say that they thought they were much smarter than they really were when during their teens and early 20s. Ah, the hubris of youth, we might say.

Do not fear for this new lost generation, though. A 22-yearold matador in Mexico City is here as a shining beacon of worthiness for today's youth among the stodgy.

Christian Hernandez of Mexico worked hard to learn and be worthy of his chosen trade: professional bullfighter extraordinaire.

He honed his muscles so he could fit into a standard-issue, gaudy, tight matador uniform and pit himself one-on-one against those angry-for-beingstabbed- repeatedly bulls. He learned all the psychological and physiological bull-stuff to understand the rage and the capacity for mayhem of his opponents, who come to the arena complete with horns and a half-a-ton of gangster attitude, even before some idiots taunt them and stab them with swords. (What's that all about?)

Hernandez knew how to work hard. He was neither soft nor chubby. He was never, or at least rarely, blah blah blah. He earned a spot in one of the prestigious, bullfighting arenas in Mexico City at the height of bull-stuff season.

That had to've made him a proud young man.

However, about 10 seconds into his big-time bullfight Sunday, he swirled his standard-issue bullfighting cape at the rampaging bull, then threw the cape into a heap of red silkiness on the dusty ground and ran for his life for the five-foot high arena wall, which he cleared in a single bound. Screaming like a little girl.

And, apparently, that's a crime in Mexico City.

According to the June 15, 2010, Associated Press article, "Terrified matador arrested after fleeing bull," Hernandez was, in fact, arrested for breach of contract and released only after paying a fine.

Apparently, he was contractually obligated to entertain the crowd with feats of testosterone-laced manliness taunting and then killing the bull. No lily-livered chickenness, no matter how logical, is allowed. Bullfighting crowds do not find this amusing. Ole.

Pride goeth, you might say, before the charge of 1,000 pounds of muscle, sinew and nostril-flared, cloven-hoofed fury.

But where pride goeth from, even at a dead run, wisdom may flow in, even if it comes in screaming. Like a little girl.

"There are some things you must be aware of about yourself," Hernandez was reported saying in a post-flight television interview. "I didn't have the ability, I didn't have the (um, Rocky Mountain oysters), this is not my thing."

Now that he's retired from cape twirling and blood-letting, Hernandez has partnered up with the infamous, peace-loving Ferdinand the bull. The pair will be selling daisies at the Mexico City farmer's market on Saturdays.

Ole, for sure, dudes.

——— Pamville Editor's Disclaimer: This column is not meant to endorse threat by means of a good, old-fashioned goring by bull horn as a means of properly educating and inducting into adulthood the youth of any age. Rather, it is meant to serve a metaphor for encouraging and allowing young people to meet life's challenges head-on to learn important life lessons and to grow as a person. Even if it means suffering mortal fear and international humiliation.

It'll learn 'em.

(We're also just sayin' that, given a sturdy red cape and the proper incentive, even we can learn to fly over a five-foot protective barrier at http:// viewnorth40.wordpress.com.)