Sign into an existing account

The year was 1991, when we got the answer to the question, what happens if the street lights don't come on. The location was Waterloo Ontario Canada, in the lakeshore north neighborhood. At the time, I was 9.

We never found out why it happened, I only now assume someone didn't call 811 before they dug a hole and it took down the street lights for more then half my neighborhood for a 5 day period, starting Monday. The whole neighborhood was shrouded in darkness at night.

Day 1 - The party

It was a hell of a party and the adults were out and the whole neighborhood had a great time, but we learned something interesting and game changing - ADULTS CANNOT SEE IN THE DARK AS WELL AS CHILDREN CAN. The adults needed flashlights to move around the neighborhood, the children did not.

Day 2 - broken windows

Typical shit, kids being kids causing trouble. But as the night progessed the children became bolder and we started testing the adults, provoking them. All we had to do was dissapear into the darkness and we were safe.

Group tactics began to evolve. Children took the name of their street (I was Mayview), and orders were starting to be given. All kids were required to keep a supply of rocks in their pockets for engaging offensively, and we developed a system for calling in reinforcements. When help was required from the group the children would relay the calls in the direction opposite from where they first heard the request, then proceed towards the call after they heard the next relay. If they heard no relay, then they were the farthest from the call. We practiced group harassment tactics on adults and soon we begin to realize our strength.

Day 3 - the lord of the flies begins

On the third day, the chaos was profound, and we started targeting houses in the neighborhood owned by adults who had, in the past, caused a hard time for us children. Back in the 80s, and 90s there were adults who would target children with belligerence and sometimes violence (Ever seen a boomer attack kids on skateboards like a psychotic for no reason?). That night, we struck back and struck back hard. Imagine 30 kids whipping rocks at your house for 5 minutes, breaking every window you have, both on your house and your car. Suffice to say the police deployed that night but they were unaware, that in the crowd was a 9yo boy raised by a biker gang and WW2 veterans who had with him a 150lbs rottweiler named Pax. The first call for help came midway through the evening.

The police had cornered a few kids and had enough light to pursue and detain. By the time I got there the cop had the kid pinned to the ground. Thats when I threatened the cop.

"We have a giant schnauzer and a doberman with us. Release the child or we loose the dogs on you." At this point the cop started arguing cop shit, so I yelled louder -"The dogs cannot tell the difference between a cop and a child molester and when we loose them, all they'll see is a man hurting a child and they will rip you the fuck apart. Will all the edge and villinay i could muster into my voice I gave him one last order - "Fall back or you're fucking dog food!" I then gave my dog the command to speak, and he did. The cop got wise and let the kid go and fell back to his car and we got out of there.

Day 4 - Parents locking kids in their bedrooms to keep them in. At this point things were almost anarchy. Children were locked in their rooms.... so we found ladders and ran them up the walls to get them out. We had become so embolded by our power that we started trashing the whole neighborhood, pulling down stop signs, destroying gardens, breaking fences and jumping on cars.


Day 5 - Every power company truck in the region was in our neighborhood trying to find the issue. And the police, not only came in force, but they brought Cavalry. Pigs on horses. On this day my parents tried to keep me in my room. I had to jump out my bedroom window, open the front door, called the dog, and we escaped into the night with me yelling "the world is mine" or something to that effect.

My mom raised horses growing up and she taught me a few things about them. One of those things, is that horses are of two minds, a left and a right and they communicate poorly with each other. Because of this, you have to train a horse on it's left and right side, and if you only train it on one side, then it can be spooked by the object on the other side because it doesn't know what it is. This is the weakness of horses.

I provided the tactical instructions for the engagement with the police - Slow running kids were to load up on marbles and rocks, casting the marbles on the ground to suppress the enemy advance, while peppering them with rocks to keep them in a state of distraction. The fast running kids, working in teams of two and three would run circles around the police, swinging sticks at the horses in an effort to spook them and throw their riders. 3 cops were thrown from their horses and those horses ran off. Satisfied that we had proved our point, I called for a retreat, and with my trusty rottweiler beside me I let him off the leash for the first time that week, and we held the battlefield until the other kids had dissapeared, then I did, on a preplanned route through the center of the darkness in the neighborhood.

That night I violated one of the, if not the highest law in Canada - CCC.46-1(B) - High Treason, Warfare against the state, and the preparations hitherto , CCC.46-2(C,D,E)- Conspiracy to commit treason, and lastly CCC.46-270(A,B)-Assault an officer of the peace

For the Waterloo regional police, it was the most humilating defeat they had ever been handed. For me, it was Friday.

And I got away with all of it.