What was that quintessential moment in your life that changed you forever?
By: David Holt
Tags: Growth, Short Story, Humor, Change, Bullying

From roughly 2nd grade through 12th grade, I was a shy kid. If you knew me, you’d say that’s not true. You’d say that I had my share of friends, that I had family that loved me, an outgoing personality and that I generally lived a rather barefoot, covered in mud, half naked, bleeding from the knees, Norman Rockwell painting, kind of life. And you’d be right.

Yet despite those things, insecurity plagued me. Since that time I’ve spent more than a few hours puzzling over why and I think I’ve distilled the essence of my self doubt down to its most elemental part.

Bullies.

As I’ve mentioned before, I grew up in Newport Beach. Not exactly the inner city, but the fact is, kids are mean no matter where you live.

Like Hollywood suggests, living in Newport was about sand and sun and laughter and blonde hair and tanned bodies and perpetual happiness. But underneath all that sunny salty sandy perfection, it was still just a town with regular people who get bored and frustrated and angry and ugly.

As in every town, there were kids that were always looking for a way to make themselves look better by showing off how they could intimidate the little praying mantis of a kid unsuccessfully trying to be invisible. You might be thinking right now that these were simply misunderstood kids. That they were probably the sons of absentee parents too busy running their companies to spend quality time with their children and therefore not instilling in them the love and compassion that we all want for our children and that would foster in them a natural empathy for the plight of their fellow youth. Maybe you’re right. But who the hell cares?

I was not interested in their tragic backstory. I had more pressing concerns. I was dealing with the decisions they were making today, not the theoretical ones they could have been making in some alternate reality.

You must consider that with my painfully thin frame, I had a well developed disbelief in my ability to protect and defend myself. What I did have were solid, high quality friends that I knew were there for me through thick and thin. These were people whose sentences I could finish. Whose thoughts I could read with no more than a passing glance. And when the bullies showed up that passing glance said “Run!”. But there were a couple of problems with these friends. The first problem was that they couldn’t be with me at all times and the second problem was that when things got dicey and the orders went out to run, they ran. Which isn’t to say that they were running to abandon me. Its just that…

There’s an old saying that goes… if you and a friend find yourselves on the savannah with a cheetah chasing you, the secret is that you don’t have to outrun the cheetah. You just have to outrun your friend.

I have never been a gifted runner. I am more of what you’d call a ‘gallumpher’. I gallumph. I take long, gawky, slow strides that don’t really get the job done. You know how when you dream that you’re being chased and for some reason you just can’t get your legs to work? No? Fine. Instead, picture a giraffe. Perhaps you’ve seen how they have that odd gait where they lift both left legs up at the same time and move them forward, then they pick up both right legs and back and forth they go. And maybe you know that seeing it happen is a little unsettling but also mesmerizing, yet somehow it works and they end up moving deceptively fast? Well imagine that happening on two legs and there is nothing deceptive about the speed at all. Now we’re closing in on what my running style was like. Can you picture that? Now slow it down to half that speed and imagine its not a giraffe, its an hysterical stick insect. And there you have it.

I wasn’t just slow, I was slow and weird.

Most of the time, bullies are content to know that they caused you to run away like a sissy. But I gave these thugs so much material to work with that it seems they just couldn’t help themselves. I like to think I brought them joy.

This was my childhood. I say it started in 2 ndgrade because before that, no one really gets how to be a bully beyond the standard pushing and stealing of toys. Maybe some name calling. Before second grade, there is no shame in calling in the teacher to settle disputes. Grudge holding is really more of an advanced class. But about 2 ndgrade, the natural evolution from a place where calling in the teacher solves the problem to “I’m going to get you! Your ass is grass!” takes place. (the “your ass is grass” line is a bit dated, but I still find it gets the point across nicely)

Fortunately in the early grades, kids have short term memory problems. They also tend to have carpool issues which helps create a barrier against making good on these threats. So usually, it all works out. But in third grade, things elevate again. Third grade is when you can ride your bike to school. Not coincidentally, this is about the time the first kid decides to take being a bully to the next level, by experimenting with actual violence and that’s when you realize that you’re in a whole new world. Psychologists have a name for it. Childhood’s End, I think they call it. If not, they should.

This is also about the time that you start to explore all the creative, alternate bike routes back home. “How interesting. I have never thought of riding home by going through Mexico.” In my experience, mixing up my patterns solved the problem.

Sometimes. Sometimes it didn’t. Some kids just can’t let things go.

Once in the third grade, I was ambushed going home. I was grabbed and slammed up against a garage wall repeatedly. Instinctively, I went into defensive mode. Everything slowed down. It was similar to the experience of doing 50 mph backwards down the highway (see post #4). I was aware of every little detail of his face. I could sense every move he made before he did it. Possibly because I had achieved another level of hyperawareness and was transcending the situation. Or possibly because he was repeating the same move over and over. That’s not important. What was important was coming up with a plan. If I was going to survive this, I needed to be unpredictable. I needed to do something he wouldn’t see coming. He expected me to fight. But that was the obvious move. If he expected me to zig, then I needed to zag.

I quickly came up with a ruse. Instead of fighting…., I would just stand there and take it. It was diabolical. He would be pounding me into the wall and I would do nothing. Eventually he would become frustrated and he’d just quit. Or he’d become too exhausted too continue. Or the sun would go down and he’d go home for dinner. Whatever happened, every possible outcome had him eventually giving up

He was falling right into my trap…

I’m kidding. To be honest, I really had no idea what to do. It was a little dreamlike. Have you seen those pictures of snakes eating lizards and the lizards just seem to be sitting there, not fighting for their lives. just waiting for it to be over? That was me. I was the lizard. Not understanding the gravity of the situation.

Strangely, my babysitter was there. He just watched. (not a dream)

Apparently he wasn’t there to beat me up. Then again, he also wasn’t there to help me either. Honestly, he seemed a little put out by the whole ordeal. I didn’t know if there was some sort of babysitter’s Hippocratic oath they take or a code of ethics they are mandated to follow, but it seemed like he should be considering protecting me. But then technically he wasn’t on the clock and it was his little brother that was slamming me into the wall. I can see how this would be a dilemma for him. Maybe he was currently being paid to watch him. Maybe he was simply being professional. Hmm.

As the pounding continued, I remember them discussing the crime that had started it all… I had informed the teacher that Micah, (his name was Micah. Classic bully name.) had stolen our ball during recess. Apparently telling the teacher anything, is breaking a sacred playground code. I did not know there was a code. I guess the code that I was using, the ‘if there’s a problem, tell the teacher’ code, was outdated. It seems that code is for 2nd grade only. I might have been absent when that was explained.

Micah seemed troubled. I mean separate from the wall slamming. He clearly had something else on his mind. I initially thought that it was my plan that was working and he was about to give up. But it turned out to be whether or not slamming me against the wall was enough or if he was wasting his time and should simply punch me in the face and be done with it. Apparently me going into defensive mode had another possible outcome that I hadn’t foreseen. I had been right that he didn’t like that I wasn’t participating. And that was causing him to reevaluate his plan. I think he felt that I wasn’t taking this seriously. It seems he felt that I had a responsibility here. I should be a more active participant. Possibly grateful. Certainly respectful.

From my point of view, it seemed to be this inner turmoil that kept him from really putting his heart into it. But then what if he determined that he was wasting his time and needed to switch things up?

I can not emphasize enough how much I did not want to be punched in the face.

Perhaps I should have spoken up. Maybe asked for leniency based on my status as a first time offender. But I wasn’t able to form words. Again, dreamlike. I felt like I could see myself from above. Like I was watching TV. Except for the pain and humiliation. And terror. All those really help with staying present in a situation. Very clarifying.

Anyway, while he was deciding, and distracted, I started to think that this might have been a good time to slip away. Micah wasn’t really paying attention. Maybe he wouldn’t notice. Except that he was still slamming me against the wall. So I hesitated. Even if Micah wasn’t fully engaged, it didn’t feel like the moment.

So I bided my time. And waited for my moment…

My babysitter was saying that he thought I should be allowed to punch Micah in the face because Micah was “being a dick”. And while this was certainly a magnanimous gesture and more what I was looking for in a babysitter, I thought, “Thank you, No.” First of all, it would probably hurt my hand. And secondly, it just didn’t feel like it would wrap this up. Maybe there was a more diplomatic solution. What would Henry Kissinger do?

But it didn’t matter anyway, because at the time his brother was suggesting that we role reverse, Micah had an epiphany. He abruptly stopped the bodyslamming me and announced that he’d figured it out. He knew what he wanted. He just wanted to see me cry.

That’s it. That’s all he wanted. Oh my God! Why didn’t you say so sooner?

I cried right then and there. Like Meryl Streep. Instantly and on cue. And like that, the episode was over. I went home, locked the door, slid all the furniture in front of it and waited under my bed until my parents got home.

I bet you’re thinking that this was my moment. Remember how we started this story? Name a specific moment that changed your life forever. Nope. This wasn’t it. This was just background. I was just painting a picture of what I was like BEFORE the moment.

I was just trying to get you to believe me when I said that I was a shy kid. I really was. Like an abused dog. Wary from that point forward. I wasn’t physically injured per se. There wasn’t really a real bruise on me. What had really happened was that I had been terrorized. My confidence had cracked.

I grew up with friends. Great friends. I had stand-up-for-you, got-your-back, with-you-til-the-end friends. And at home I had A-list celebrity status. But as I’ve mentioned, they can’t be around all the time and frankly, what kind of a person would I be, if I needed constant protecting? So I learned to adapt. Survive.

As you get older, bullying changes. In many ways, it goes from bad to worse. As they age, kids start to truly hone their skills. From year to year, they matriculate from overt acts to the more subtle arts of gossip and intimidation. As they begin to recognize that violence can have negative repercussions, kids experiment with more emotional tactics. Besides the groundwork has already been laid. Now because we know that actual violence is on the table, the more thoughtful bully has only to refer to it. There’s no real need to get one’s hands dirty. Unfortunately not all bullies fall into the ‘thoughtful’ category.

Of course, everyone advances and learns at their own unique pace, but overall, I think most of the really great strides in the field of bullying have come from the work that’s being done in junior high. A lot of really creative ideas get developed there. Lots of different possibilities get experimented with and expanded upon. Junior high really is the skunkworks in that particular field.

For example, here’s a classic: using ambush questions.

“Did you actually mean to wear that?”

From a purely academic perspective, I think this technique is a fun one because the bully really has no reason to ask. He’s just fishing. Trying to start something. Experimenting.

But for all the work being done in bullying, there is equally as much research into the counter moves employed by the victims. For instance, the appropriate response seems to be either “No, I got dressed in the dark”, or “I lost a bet” which lightens the mood with the sheepish ‘I’m a dope’ strategy. You follow that up by quietly walking away. Or I know a lot of people just go with silence and keep walking. Personally, I’m not a fan of this strategy. I’ve found that it usually doesn’t satisfy the bully and just leads them to a new line of questioning. Usually something impromptu about me being a ‘retard’. (‘Retard’ has dropped out of fashion in recent years. It appears that bullies are sensitive to using politically incorrect terms of demoralization) Either way, this is why I’ve always been such a firm believer in just sacrificing all personal pride, agreeing with them and then just keep walking. This usually ends the encounter with the laughter from the bully’s groupies being a minor penance.

Another one from the bully’s catalog is this perennial favorite,

“Do you have any friends?”.

The counter move on this one’s a little trickier. If you say yes, a clever bully will ask for names. This puts you into the awkward place of having to give names. And say it with the confidence that if your friends were here that they would back you up. Usually the friends aren’t there. So the bully is free to go with circumstantial or even made up evidence. “Hey Pete, this guy here says that Ed is his friend? Didn’t we just have a conversation with Ed this morning about who his friends were? Do you remember him mentioning this guy? I sure don’t.”

Really the best policy I found was just to consider the whole school a viper nest and just be prepared for anything and everything. But no strategy is perfect because, eventually, everyone has to go to PE.

There’s no hiding in PE. Everyone knows what you can do and what you can’t. You can’t hide anything under baggy clothes. You can’t pull a baseball cap down low. Your only hope is to blend into the crowd. Which is actually not that hard when everyone is dressed alike. But that’s the only good news. Though you can’t be singled out for your clothes, all your other talents (or lack thereof) are on full display.

Don’t understand the rules? Don’t know which end of the racket to hold? Just know that everything you do is being archived in the gray matter of your worst nightmare. Considering that these knuckle draggers couldn’t tell you what continent the Mississippi river is on, they have a remarkable recall of all your most personal idiosyncracies.

The bullies run everything through their filters, label it for future cross referencing, and generally commit to memory for retrieval later, in a more private setting. Somewhere a little more intimate. Like the locker room.

Really you need to appreciate the genius of it. The timing works like a swiss watch. During class you reveal that you can’t run, catch, throw, climb, do a pull up, a push up, have no timing, your gut hangs out, you’re flatulent, you have asthma, you like unicorns, or any shortcoming from a long list of possibilities.

Then you head back to the locker room sweaty, embarrassed, insecure and impatient to get in and out as fast as possible. You keep watch over your shoulder for the known bullies and make sure they are well behind you so that you can change in peace. Preferably, in 10 seconds or less. But like some B-movie, the monster always seems to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Not only are you not finished changing when he walks up, usually you’ve just taken off some vital piece of clothing when you get the shove in the back.

“Nice job out there ‘dickweed’” (Have you ever wondered about the etymology of that word. Dickweed. I have. Is it an actual plant? Is it offensive? Presumably.)

“Thanks for losing the game for us!”

Now with no pants, you are available for the sucker punch. The easiest of ridicules. Even if you aren’t completely exposed, referencing your anatomy is just low hanging fruit (pun intended)…

Fortunately junior high doesn’t last forever. It just feels that way at the time. Eventually we do get to high school. And in high school, there’s safety in numbers. That and the bullies usually get the scent of estrogen and have other things on their minds. But like I said before, the damage is done.

I was a shy kid. Which sucked. There are so many things I would have liked to have tried in high school if I’d had the confidence. Don’t get me wrong, I had a great high school experience. But looking back I would have liked to try out for the basketball team. I would have liked to try out for the school play. I would have liked to do a lot of things. But I was who I was. To try and break out and do something different during high school wasn’t going to happen. No one would have bought it. But I wouldn’t be in high school forever. Changes were coming.

But its funny, even knowing it wouldn’t last forever, when my moment happened, it came right out of my blind spot. I didn’t see it coming at all. And frankly I almost missed it when it did.

But I didn’t.

And for the first time in my life, rather than clam up and hide, I stepped up to the plate and swung. Did I hit it out of the park? Doesn’t matter. The important thing was that I swung.

I graduated from high school on a Wednesday. As valedictorian, I gave the commencement address to the senior class. The sky was a brilliant blue, it was 75 degrees and everyone was excited to see me. I remember it like it was yesterday. I’d had sex earlier that day in the costume closet behind the stage with one of the cheerleaders and that night I played guitar in my first paid live show. That was a pretty good day.

Ok, I made that last part up. I graduated on a Thursday. But the other part was true. I did graduate.

The next day was Grad Night. A fantastic night, worthy of its own story, but not right now. We went in at 8:00pm and we came out at 6:00am the following morning. Elated, excited, exhausted. Two hours later, my mother and my girlfriend (I did have a girlfriend) dropped me off at USC for orientation to become an exchange student. And when they drove away, I walked into…

…high school.

At least that’s what it looked like. It may have been sleep deprivation, but it looked like a John Hughes film. Kids were sitting in groups on the grass, talking and laughing. A few were playing hacky sack. Some were throwing a frisbee. And that’s when it hit me.

No one knew anyone else here. And more importantly, no one knew me.

From this moment forward, I could be anyone. And amazingly I already knew who I wanted to be. I didn’t need a minute to strategize. I knew. All I wanted was to be confident. And so I collected my insecurities, swallowed them and did something I had never done before. I walked up to someone and said,

“Throw me the Frisbee”.

And a little while later, I followed that stunt up with another. I said “What’s your name? Where you from? Where you going?” and just like that, I’d done it. I’d been healed. Dave 2.0 was launched.

People came to me to ask questions. Like if I’d like to eat dinner with them. If I’d like to hang out. If I had a roommate yet. It was surreal. And magical and everything I’d ever dreamed of. And from that day since, I’ve never looked back. The shy kid was gone.

That …was my Moment.