My Bullying Journey (pt 1)

The early years

So, explaining how I got “here” might take a lot of backstory. Even before writing this, I was paring things down in my head to try to filter out the unnecessary bits. I may need to do more paring down as time goes on.

I was born April 26, 1970 in Oakland, CA. When I was 3 months old, my birth mom called her father Gordy and his new wife Betty to say she could no longer take care of the baby. Betty flew to Oakland and brought him back to Washington. By the time of my first birthday, Gordy and Betty had adopted me.

That’s the Cliff’s Notes version of my birth. There are a ton of other details, but I just wanted to show that I’m adopted, but I’m still blood related to my (adopted) Dad’s side of the family. So, if I go trying to trace my genetics, I can only go so far. From here on out, when I say “mom” or “dad,” I’ll be referring to Betty and Gordy. If I have to refer to the other, I’ll say “birth mom.”

All my life growing up, I was sort of an “odd duck.” I knew my head worked differently than other kids my own age. I didn’t make many friends. I didn’t play the same way aas them or with the same things. I didn’t know to socialize with them. I usually just waited for them to invite me into their circles, which didn’t happen. I was a music fan from, essentially the time I was born. The way I like to word it is that I have a photographic memory, but with popular music. Instead of playing with kids at the playground, my early memories are grooving to “Me and Mrs. Jones” by Billy Paul when I was 2. And then there was dancing to “Tie a Yellow Ribbon” when I was 4. Music has always been such an ethereal and emotional (near spiritual) environment for me. While most people might have music on the background and maybe bounce their heads to it, it actually lives and breathes with me; it has personality. So the music became my friends.

School

In school, I had the most difficulty. I was already well-versed in the ability to avoid social groups. And my behavior didn’t help matters any. I remember one time in the 2nd grade, the teacher was telling the class about the Statue of Liberty. I started daydreaming and was imagining the statue standing firm and bold, the abstract themes of “beacon of hope and freedom” and all that. Lost in thought, I rolled my papers into a cone and held it high in my hand as if I were the Statue of Liberty. In the real world, my teacher thought I was raising my hand to ask a question. I had to admit that no, I was just daydreaming. I could be wrong, but it seemed the bullying I later endured seemed to stem from that act.

But yes, the bullying then started. If there had been a division of people who just ignored me, and people who just outright disliked me, later everyone just belonged to the same group. It seemed like nearly everyone teased me, harrassed or bullied me, physically abused me, or supported those who did. There was a dwindling percentage who just ignored the situation. It eventually got to a point where even the people who were mostly kind and friendly to me would tease me. So I couldn’t use teasing as a delimiter to separate the good from the bad. Even the good teased me, so there was something within me that just begged for the teasing. I mean, I didn’t fight back. Maybe everyone has to put up with a bit of teasing. In, I think the 9th grade, my best friend Todd tried shoving what he said was a used condom in my mouth. Of course I didn’t fight back. He later said it was a finger bandage his friend Lars had used. And this was my best friend. Don’t get me wrong, I knew at the time that a friend shouldn’t be doing this, but when all you have to choose from are people who do this or worse, you just accept for anyone who wants to be in your life.

My bullying was so bad that my mom spent many days in the principal’s office to try to work on it with the school. At one point, my mom wanted to put me in the local private Christian school. I wanted any other solution than that for many reasons. I’ve always been a very skeptical person, and I’m now an atheist because of it. I knew that that wasn’t the type of environment for me. Also, I didn’t think just switching schools was going to solve it. If I was bullied in the public school, I was sure I’d be bullied in the private school. However…

In 4th grade, I didn’t go to school in my hometown. My dad was a truck driver and was gone from Sunday evening to Friday evening. For one year, my mom and I moved in with my sister Linda and her husband Brian. It was nice to live with my sister and my nephews. And one of the kids in my little cul-de-sac neighborhood was Carol, a friend of mine (one of the good ones) from my hometown. You know, honestly, I don’t think I ever experienced any bullying or teasing while there. I actually played with friends in my neighborhood!