My elementary school was 162 steps from my house growing up. The school was close enough to my house that I was never late to school and the schoolyard was my personal playground after and before school. My school felt like an extension of my backyard where I would play, imagine and dream. It was my haven, until it wasn't.
When I in sixth grade, I fell victim for the first time (but not the last time) to a calculated campaign of bullying and harassment by a group of girls in the grade above me. This is how it started: a hand-me-down pair of red leather snow boots.
One of my aunts was cleaning out her closet and brought me a pair of cast-offs boots because I needed a new pair. It was the mid-90s and they had a slightly-rounded pointed toe and they (in retrospect) were kind of ugly, relaxed cowboy boots. These were, by no one's definition, sexy boots. They were just boots that happened to be red and I wore them because they were free.
I was one of the girls who developed quickly and early and was the tallest girl in my class until everyone else caught up in high school. I never grew an inch past five-foot-five and I stopped growing by the seventh grade. I was bookish and smart and extremely lonely. I had some friends in school but they always seemed to cycle around and I was grateful if a "cool" girl was friends with me for a time. So one morning, I wore my red boots to school and this is what happened: "Slut. Whore. Nice boots, bitch. You think you're so great? You're ugly. Fat pig. Slut, slut, slut, slut, whore."
Devastated by the constant barrage of verbal abuse coming from the group of mean girls in the grade above me, I went to mom for advice on how to deal with them.
My mom was great and did her best to teach me to verbally fight back when they were harassing me. It was expected that this was something that some people just had to get through and we had to learn how to deal with it. The next time that the group of girls came at me in the school yard, I had my friends at my back. I pretended that I wasn't sad or scared, crossed my arms in front of me and yelled back: "Sticks and stones will break my bones but names will never hurt me. What are you going to do about it, you little ant?" The ringleader, who was short, was surprised and looked back at her friends who were egging her on and asked, "I don't know what I am supposed to do now."
The abuse got a bit better after that point although the girls continued to wait for me after school to call me nasty things during that short walk home. It didn't stop entirely until the girls went on to high school. I believe the ringleader, who was from a good home with money, was eventually sent to boarding school.
By the time that seventh grade hit and they were no longer at my school, I felt like a crushing weight had been lifted. To my utter shame, I dealt with this relief by turning into a bully myself that year. It only lasted one year, my descent into Mean Girl hell still fills me with regret for the hurt that I caused during my stint as a horrible person. In high school, I tried to apologize to everyone that fell victim to my awfulness during that period of time but I know that I missed people. There is one person that I know I didn't apologize to and I wish that I could now.
D.M. I am sorry. You didn't deserve my meanness and I sincerely apologize for my horrific behaviour. My adolescent brain was still forming and I remember thinking that if I was nice to the dorks or the losers that I would become a loser (again) by association and it would start again. It became increasingly clear that the only way that I was going to avoid that happening again was to become part of a larger group (safety in numbers) or to fade into the background as to attract no notice at all. I was wrong and I am extremely sorry.
I have been harassed in similar ways as an adult in my working life. You know the story. You work with a bully who picks on someone for no reason and this person is so powerful and angry that you do nothing except pray that he (or she) doesn't start hating you. Then one day, the hatred and meanness is turned towards you and everyone else you work with is grateful it's not them. You go to your manager because you believe that your manager is supposed to protect you in your working environment and you are told that you need to avoid him and try not to attract attention. Your self-esteem crumbles, you work suffers, your home life suffers and you pray that the jerk leaves the job you formerly loved. He eventually leaves and now your job is better, but tainted, because the people who are supposed to protect you, didn't and now nothing is the same. You move on, you move cities, you get a new job and then this time, the manager is harassing, calling down and yelling at your friend and colleague and eroding their self-esteem. What do you do?
You can't do nothing.
Even mouthy, book-nerds, such as myself, have to stand up against a systemic bully and take the appropriate steps to protect themselves and their colleagues because if it's one thing that I have learned throughout my experiences it that you are never safe. Even if meanness and vitriol is not directed at you, it could be tomorrow. You never know when a mean girl is going to follow you home yelling, "Whore!"
An eleven-year old girl wearing red boots doesn't deserve that and neither do you. Stop being mean. No one should cry at work or at school or to be made to feel less than worthy of being respected.
