In the past week I've been very busy. On Thursday, I walked in to my bosses' boss and asked her to give me a promotion, a raise, and editorial control over 2 books. On Friday, she did. The decision on whether or not to follow my boss to Hudson Street finally happened and I chose to stay.

But beyond that, I called my mom last night to discuss what had happened (and to be honest, why she didn't sound too thrilled about it). She prefaced this story about my dad and uncles with, "we didn't want to bother you since you were making such a big decision..." and I'm going to preface it with that my uncle David is one of my favorite relatives, my favorite uncle by far (considering I have 10 biological uncles, that's saying alot!).

On the day I left Wisconsin, my dad, uncle Dave and uncle Dan were all ice fishing. My dad and Dave both have ice shanties on Lake Alice, which is between the two towns (merrill and tomahawk) where my mom and my dad, respectively, grew up. Lake Alice is ringed with houses, both summer and year-round, so they didn't suspect too much when a dog came over without an owner in sight and started playing with them. My uncle Dave threw a stick for the dog, but stopped when the owner, a woman, came into view and started to call for the dog. She had to get really close to them and the dog in order to get the dog to come with her (actually grab its collar). My dad and his brothers laughed at a joke Dave probably made, and the woman shouted back something along the lines of "you think this is funny? I have a two year old in the car, fuck you!"

Well the guys were taken aback, but they didn't do anything wrong, so they went on with their fishing (and drinking beer). When the sun began to set, they went back to my dad's ice shanty and started playing cards. Two games in, someone pounded on the door. They thought it was my uncle Matt messing with them, so they laughed and laughed harder when they wouldn't open the door.

I was in that ice shanty a few days before, and it's small. There's a wood stove in one corner, and some wood along that wall. You can fit up to five people sitting but its only about 6 feet tall in the middle. Because the wood stove gets truly hot in that small of a space, my dad constructed a door out the back that is on hinges at the bottom (picture the way a dollhouse opens up).

Next thing my family knew, the window was broken and a guy yelled, "You've been screwing with my wife?" (or something like that). Then the husband and his friend came in and literally beat up my dad and my uncles.

The lantern was thrown to the floor and went out--the guy punched my dad, then threw Dave out the previously closed back door. Dave landed on the ice and was stunned while Dan was thrown up against the wall (and Dan is no small guy!). My dad couldn't really return the punches because the husband's friend was wearing a snowmobile helmet (which, in case you don't know, is about the size and hardness of a motorcycle helmet) and started kicking him while he was down.

When it was all said and done, they called the cops and went to their respective doctors. My dad was the worst off--he has a bruised liver, cracked ribs, and a shiner that stretched from one eye across the bridge of his nose to nearly the other one. Dave, who just had his teeth fixed, has to have over $3,000 of dental work to fix what they did to his nose and mouth. My uncle Dan had a huge bump on his head that gave him a headache for four straight days.

My dad and uncles identified the family by the dog in their yard (they weren't home when the cops brought them over there) and by looking the address up in these plat books we have out in the boondocks that show who owns what land in the county. But then my mom said, "if we can find them that easily why can't they?" and for the first time since we've lived in the country, my dad locked every deadbolt in our house. The cops still haven't arrested the guy, but given the holidays my mom understands the delay.

My brother, who is a big 21 year old guy, wanted vengeance with my uncle Dave, but the rest of the fam talked them down. Meanwhile, halfway across the country, I can't get over it.

Not only does this call into question my general view of humanity (where there's always going to be assholes) but also the mortality of my family. My dad will be 52 on Thursday, and he could have been hurt a lot worse. What if those men had been crazy enough to have guns? What if they get madder after one of them is arrested?

Not to mention the emotional impact. Back in the day, my dad and his brothers were a tough crew. Everyone knows about how the boys got beat up--my uncle Mark, who is my mom's brother, works for the city of Merrill and heard about it within 2 days. None of them slept the first night. I wonder how my dad is going to take his own immortality and this, a physical fall from grace if nothing else.

It certainly scared the shit out of me. And I live in New York.