Personal & Political: "The Night My Bullies Finally Won"
I wrote this piece for Dime Magazine shortly after the inauguration, having been given time to reflect on the extreme feelings I underwent after the election and the ways it resonated with memories of my childhood. I guess this really helps me understand the meaning of "The personal is political."
Here's a snippet:
There’s an old platitude that says children don’t know how to hate – that meanness and cruelty is solely the domain of adults whose hearts have been corrupted by the sorrows and disappointments of life. I’m not so sure about that.
When I was a kid, bullies were plentiful and friends were few. Family told me it was because I was smart and that I liked to read, or that I was better looking than the rest of them (thanks, mama). No matter the reason, my bullies were relentless – and it hurt.
More than once, I got in my mom’s car after school and burst into tears after holding them in all day. Third to sixth grade were the worst years. It seemed like I couldn’t go a day without being called a name or having some cruel prank carried out at my expense.
Even so, my bullies never dimmed my sense of self worth. I internalized the messages of songs I heard on the radio at that time – songs like LeAnn Rime’s “Don’t Ever Lose That Light In Your Eyes,” or Mark Willis’ “Don’t Laugh at Me,” the lyrics to which read:
Don’t laugh at me, don’t call me names
Don’t get your pleasure from my pain
In God’s eyes, we’re all the same
But I credit my family most of all; as long as I can remember, I was raised to believe that I was special (no, not a ‘little snowflake,’ thanks), that I was kind, that I was handsome, that I was smart, and most of all, that I was good. More often than not, small children will start to believe what you tell them. My family’s words had far more power over my self-image than my bullies’ words.
Still, it hurt that other kids couldn’t see the good things in me that I saw in myself. It hurt that other kids chose to be cruel for no reason. It hurt that kids would come close to befriending me, only to back away, bow to peer pressure, and join in with the bullies.
I remember being 8-years-old and reading the Thank You notes in CD booklets and the acknowledgements in books I’d read. And I remember thinking, “One day, I’m going to do something important, and when I do, I’m going to say thank you to all of my ‘friends’ who taught me how to be strong” (I was making plans to thank my haters before thanking the haters was a thing).
By high school, I had moved to another town and the bullying had subsided. At worst, I was the socially awkward smart kid who didn’t know how to interact with others thanks to years of isolation. Still, my fellow teens were at least friendly to me – and not just when they were trying to copy off of my test paper in Biology I. By the end of my tenth grade year, I had made a best friend. I made a few more in my remaining high school years.
But it was in college where I finally found my place. There, I developed a sizable friend group. I learned how to turn my awkwardness into an asset, and my social skills blossomed so much that, on any given night, I could go to a bar and inevitably strike up a long, fulfilling conversation with a perfect stranger. Some of those strangers are people I consider friends to this day.
Sometimes, I’d marvel at how far along I’d come. I’d wish I could go back in time and show it all to that lonely sixth grade kid who once skipped lunch (ensuring punishment from the principle) so that he could hide behind a bush outside the cafeteria and cry after a morning spent feigning resolve in the face of non-stop, back-to-back episodes of cruelty. He’d begun looking for company in songs like “Loser” by 3 Doors Down (a song that no sixth grader should be able to identify with in any way – just read the lyrics). That kid never really believed the adults who promised him that, one day, things would be better. Seeing who I had become in my early twenties, I wished so much that I could go back and tell him, “They’re right.”
I’d smile to myself thinking about how happy the younger me would’ve been to know that one day I’d be surrounded by friends who did see in me the good things I saw in myself.
Even as life improved for me, I watched from afar as my former bullies’ lives stagnate or completely disintegrate. Some never finished high school. Few entered college, but the ones who did all seemed to drop out quickly. Many married into misery before they even reached their twenties. Others had kids long before they were ready to be parents and struggled to keep the lights on.
None of that gave me any pleasure. Being given a chance to say, “I forgive you” would’ve given me pleasure. Hearing, “I’m sorry” would’ve been gratifying. But where they had once found pleasure in my pain, I found none in theirs.
Even so, it ratified what the adults in my life had once told me – that the bullying would some day end, that I would overcome it, and that my bullies would be the ones who finished last.
And with that sober thought, I knew that I’d finally overcome them. For years, without gloating, I held onto the knowledge that young Ashton had been vindicated. I had won.
And then came November 8th, 2016.
Read the rest:
http://www.dime.me/2017/01/21/night-bullies-finally-won/