Match Made in Heaven - remembering my grade-school bully

Terry’s nickname was “Italian Stallion.”  He was a prepubescent cross between two powerhouse male celebrities at the time: Ralph Macchio and Sylvester “Sly” Stallone (Ralph’s pin-up looks and Sly’s monosyllabic vernacular, to be precise).  Extremely confident and a natural extrovert in every sense, his rise to “leader” status at our school was swift and obvious.  If the cultural trend of rampantly over-medicating minors had hit our generation rather than the next, Terry definitely would have been the kid under the slide selling blister-packed pills for cash or smokes. His position at the top of our collective social hierarchy, enviable to many, remained unchecked for seven years. 

When it came to his primary social vehicles for gaining collective acceptance and praise through the ongoing dominance and humiliation of the least favoured in our peer group, I very quickly landed in the direct center of Terry’s crosshairs, and I remained there for the majority of grade school.

“Clothes, Hair, and Accessories” – as it turned out, this timeless Holy Trinity of status-markers both defined and cemented our pecking-order placement on the grade-school Totem Pole.  The weight of these figurative score-cards carried palpable impacts we would feel for the rest of our lives – an “A” rank in the schoolyard was profoundly more important than an “A” in Math.  By sheer default, I came to represent the very antithesis of  the “A”, “B” and “C” Lists combined.   If we’re being honest, whether I was even a candidate for the scarcely-populated “D-List” remains arguable.

To recall my grade-school wardrobe is to recall the phrase “function trumps fashion,” a veritable death sentence within the context of the eighties.  Even by such modest measures as the Sears Catalogue, I failed quite miserably.  My mother felt it was unnecessary to purchase “new” clothing for me when it was clear I’d simply outgrow any item in a relatively short amount of time.  (“It won’t fit next year - what a waste of money that would be,” she’d mutter, while arbitrarily selecting the clothes and shoes that would fit both my insistently changing body and her rigidly fixed budget).  Whether I personally liked an item of clothing or footwear that ended up on my body was quite irrelevant. 

In pre-nineties Chinatown, the two main stretches were Pender and Keefer Streets, between Gore and Carrall.  This vibrant neighbourhood entailed row upon row of prominent boutiques, fish and meat vendors, storefronts packed with pungent medicines and exotic dried seafood and mushrooms, mirror-walled dim sum palaces, steaming bakeries and noodle-houses.  Scattered throughout the bustling four-block radius was a handful of thrift stores, seemingly ancient remnants of a dying retail breed.  Strewn haphazardly like Mr. T’s pity for fools, these five-and-dime shops were simultaneously everywhere and nowhere in Chinatown, a handful of innocuous museums quietly rooted within the ongoing tides of economic progress around them.    

Densely packed with all manner of wares, these quiet stores were surreal time capsules, their conspicuous absence of contemporary glam rendering the degree to which they each “stuck out” to be as glaringly red as the sorest of thumbs.  They all shared a telltale atmospheric ambience that included indescribably bad lighting, a faint but perpetual scent of mothballs, fish broth, smoke and whiskey, and a blatant lack of any single item within that could be remotely associated with the current decade.  These were the stores my mother favoured whenever it became necessary to purchase clothes for me, and my wardrobe was generally piecemealed from the discount bins she would find in the bowels thereof.  Mismatched bargains and ragtag threads individually boasting colours, textures and patterns not seen on red carpets or runways anywhere since the Paleolithic Age, and resulting in profoundly unstylish aesthetic cacophonies – fashion faux pas of biblical proportions.  The mere thought of such aberrant coordination would have sent Vogue’s supreme designing elite directly to the precise end of a steady Thorazine drip.  

As it turned out, “vintage appreciation” didn’t exist for another fifteen years and at the time, all “thrift store” meant was “bargain basement shit for the ugly and poor”, a fact I was reminded of through the daily beatings I received at school from Terry and his stylishly frocked followers.   In hindsight, some Thorazine would have been nice.

Further to my yet-to-be-recognized-for-its-panache wardrobe, I additionally sported for many long years the absolute worst home-fashioned bowl cut hairstyle in the history of worst-do-it-yourself-haircuts. Like, ever. (“Salons are overpriced and unnecessary…  now hold still!” my mother would bark, repeatedly attempting to cut my bangs straight and simply rendering them shorter and shorter and shorter with every pass).  Bowl cuts are to hair couture as Ron Jeremy’s thespian legacy is to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (although even the porn industry has its own rendition of a yearly awards-gala - accept it or not, adult entertainment is a craft like any other).  While the leading feminine hair-fashions in the 80’s were long, wavy feathered locks à la Farah Fawcett or Heather Locklear (as illustrated by the iconic and apparently mandatory posters of Farah and Heather that graced every pre-adult bedroom wall in North America), the hairstyle crowning my head from 1978-‘84 recalled visions of rotund French Abbots in 15th-century monasteries, Arthurian court jesters… or possibly but not necessarily bowls.  It remains unclear which is worse.  If we’re being honest, even the long-ridiculed mullet might have been more favourable.

When it came to the accessories in my life, “Amish-inspired Minimalism” may not be the perfect summary, but it’s the one that springs to mind.  With an emphasis on plain, simple necessity and a not a speck more, my mother was unwittingly teaching me the tenets of fundamental environmentalism decades before green thinking was remotely socially popular or generally accepted.  At her manic insistence, I re-used my generic, no-name school supplies each year, and repeatedly, until it was impossible to use them any longer.   (“You don’t need new paper,” she would state factually.  “There’s still the other side of the page.  Do you want them to clear-cut another forest just because you want clean white paper with no lines on it or writing on the other side? Paper is trees.  And there’s a good two inches left of that perfectly good pencil – why buy a new one?  It’s made of wood you know.  Wood is trees.”)   

The conspicuous absence of coordinated stationary and tidy sets of glittery, sparkly and yummy-scented writing utensils in my desk at school created no less than a rather blinding spotlight that flooded the direct center of my face for the duration of every moment I spent inside the classroom.  As it turned out, that very spotlight fuelled ever-growing fields of status-bombs on my general Totem Pole assessment overall.

Other means of measuring grade-school status came through the “what’s in my bedroom” discourse.  (The adult equivalents of this social exercise can be illustrated through the yearly distribution of such publications as the IKEA furniture catalogue, endless popular media depicting intimate details of celebrity lives and specifically, their purchases – everything from homes to cars to jewellery to prenuptials – and the direct correlations between our own esteem and the comparisons thereto).   I was never actually a participant in these specific schoolyard dialogues, but since we’re being honest, I wouldn’t have succeeded by this measure regardless.  The absence of a giggling gaggle of BFFs aside, I didn’t actually have a bedroom, let alone things in one, to discuss. 

While I listened to girls around me boasting about canopy beds and matching dressers and the posters and Teen Beat pinups that graced their walls, or conversely complaining about needing to share space with a loathed sibling, my own material yearnings quietly smouldered, along with an ever-present wonderment about what it would be like to have any space of my own to call a bedroom, complete with a door.  I slept on a rusty, army-issue fold-up cot in the L-shaped hallway of our one-bedroom apartment.  Placed directly between our cat’s litter box and our front door, my bed’s width nestled perfectly between the bare, narrow walls, with a cozy single inch of space to spare.  As was the routine for years, the cot was folded down every night so I could go to sleep, and it was folded up and moved aside in the morning so we could exit our apartment.  Subsequently, I was destined not for slumber parties but a lifetime of lower-back pain (from the cot, not the litter box), an acute sensitivity to the smell of cat urine (from the litter box, not the cot), and a celebrity-appreciation not for red-carpet starlets or Teen Beat pinups, but for the smiling black cartoon feline that graces every package of “Johnny Cat” brand litter.

Combined, the accumulative weight of my Totem Pole failures effectively eliminated 99% of my social skills, self-esteem and confidence, as though these primary ingredients of my ego and identity were naught but olfactory wisps that could be annihilated with a mere sprinkling of market-reputable, low-odor, easy-scoop litter. 

As far as a coupling between a Bully and Victim goes, Terry’s and mine was, in fact, rather a match made in heaven.

PREQUEL:  Schoolyard Waltz

“Beware of Dog” scrawled in thick, black grade school script on construction paper taped securely to my desk. Muffled snickers and giggles fill the room.  My head fills with a burning pressure and my stomach twists in knots that are becoming familiar as this new daily ritual called “grade one” settles.  I begin trying to peel the tape with the dull, bitten ends of my fingernails.  Only one person made the sign, but it’s clear everyone shares the sentiment. 

~~~

Walking from the library through the covered cement play area back to the stairwell leading to our classroom, I keep my head down and count my paces.  Over the past year, I’ve learned that if I move fast enough, I can make it back to class without being kicked, shoved or spat on.  Sometimes he just hits my head in passing, which I prefer.  It’s quick and hurts less. 

~~~

“Nice fucking clothes… where’d’ya get them? A dumpster?”  

“You know that you look like you’re wearing a fucking bowl on your head, right?”  

“You’re so fucking ugly that a dog wouldn’t want you.”

Endless malicious denigrations weave through my mind like razor echoes I can’t ever get away from. I feel hollow and time blends from moment to moment over days, weeks and years.

~~~

Every cell in my being knows to never respond – I’ve seen what they do to others who try to defend themselves and it all gets very worse super quick.  If I don’t do or say anything they’ll move on.  The burning pressure in my head and excruciating knots in my stomach will pass quicker the less I have to interact with them.  The hope is they’ll just get bored of me and leave me alone.

~~~

“Lookit her fucking clothes - her parents are totally bums and they get that shit from the dump.” 

“Lookit her fucking hair -  hilarious, right? Like a fucking bowl.”

“Lookit how ugly she is - gag me with a spoon. She’s grosser than puke.”

“Lookit how she just stands there not saying anything… freak.”

~~~

Day in, day out… they just never seem to get bored of me.

~~~

My teacher sees me take a twenty dollar bill out of my pocket in the cloakroom and she confiscates it immediately, saying, “no one in grade two has any reason to bring that much money to school.”  (It was 1980 and twenty dollars was worth considerably more than it is today). She tells the principal and he calls my mother, and this fact fills me with an entirely new sense of dread.  I can’t say how I got the money (I stole it from my mother’s boyfriend’s wallet), or why I brought it to school (Terry assured me physical pain if I didn’t give him twenty dollars).  Now I’m in major trouble with the principal, my mother, her boyfriend… but most of all, I'm really scared of Terry and what he’ll do to me when I don’t have the money he wants.  I feel sick.

~~~

It’s just before 8am and I’m almost at school.  I work in the school library every morning.  It’s quiet, no one goes there, and I don’t have to be outside in the school yard when all the other kids arrive.  I turn a corner and begin heading down the last block towards the entrance to the school grounds.  Terry and two of his friends come out of nowhere, pushing me off the sidewalk and pinning me to the chain link fence. 

“Hey Shithead – where’d’ya think you’re going?”  Standing directly in front of me, Terry leans forward and the fence behind me bends as far as it will go with the weight of my body against it.  “You never gave me my money, you cheap little chink,” he continues.  He grabs my shoulder bag and throws it on the ground.  His two buddies move in and place themselves on either side of me. We’re all standing on the freshly mown grass and I notice the thick wet green slivers sticking to our shoes in discordant little clumps.

“You see that piece of shit over there?” Terry grabs a fistful of my hair and moves my head slightly to redirect my line of sight.  I see the pile of dog feces he’s referring to, no more than a foot to the right of us.  “That’s what you are!”

I hear the rustle of leaves from the hedge across the street, unseen birds singing their morning songs.  My gaze stays fixed to the ground, as it always does in these moments. He’s used to this.  This is our dance - he knows I won’t do or say anything.  Terry grabs me by the shoulders, pulls me towards him, and throws me to the ground.  His two buddies reposition themselves to stand at each of my sides.  Terry leans over as though he were scolding a dog.

“You little piece of shit,” he shoves me.  His friends laugh.  “Lookit her - dumb as a fucking post!”

On my hands and knees, I’m counting blades of grass.  Usually their interactions with me are quick – the insults are thrown, the laughter is had, and they move on.  Today, there’s no one around and at the moment time feels slower and distorted like a funhouse mirror reflection. 

“Rub her nose in it!” one of his buddies suggests.  “That’s what my mom does to our dog when he shits in the house.  Tells him he’s been bad.”  “Yeeaaaaahh!” the other friend says, enthusiastically.  “That’ll teach her!”  More laughter.

Terry, delighted at the idea, pulls me over to their new focus - the small clump of feces that will provide their momentary gratification.  “Yeah,” he says.  “You’re no better than a fucking dog.”  He repositions his grip on my hair, grabbing at the nape of my neck, and pushes my face down. 

I stand up slowly.  I wipe the wet grass from my hands and knees, noting the green stains that will probably not wash out. My mother will be furious. I pick up my bag and walk quickly towards the school.  I’ll go to the bathroom to wash my face before going to the library as usual.  I wish the principal had just expelled me from school for stealing the money.  It’s going to be a very long day.

~~~

I’m taking the long way back to the classroom from the library.  There’s extra stairs and you have to go about a half-block extra but it’s always worth it to stay away from the main entrance.  The second bell has gone so everyone should already be in class.  I often plan to be late – especially since the dog shit incident last year.  I go through the heavy fire doors at the end of the hall and standing just outside the recessed doorway is Terry and one of his friends.  As it turns out, their buddy Walter has decided to use the bathroom and they’re waiting for him.  Just my luck.

“Hey Shitface,” Terry says.  I back up, my hands behind me.  The fingers of my right hand curve around the corner of the recessed doorway, resting there for a moment.  I feel some kind of security in the cold bricks, their permanence… their immutable presence.  They’re just always there, like trees.  Solid and un-judging. 

“Hiding in the library again with your stupid books?  Fucking geek!” Terry and his friend laugh.  Noticing Walter through the thick, metal-grate-covered glass window in the fire door, they laugh and point at me.  “Look who’s here Walter – it’s Shitface!”

I turn my head over my right shoulder just as Walter kicks the fire door open to make his grand entrance into the scene.  “Well hellloooooooo Shitface!” he yells.  “How ya do- ”

He stops abruptly.  The other’s laughter stops simultaneously.  The glee on their faces changes to instant alarm. 

I look down, and I immediately feel explosive pain.  The fire door has slammed against the wall directly where my hand was resting.  Blood is gushing from my right index finger, the top half of which is hanging from a bone that is protruding from the first knuckle.  It looks like it could fall off at any moment, and I’ve instinctively cradled it with my left hand. My skin is mangled hamburger and throbs in dark jarring shades of blue and purple and all the wrong colours from a swollen panic palette.  My right hand is size of a small baseball glove, and pain is detonating up and through my entire arm in aberrant bursts that threaten to stop my heart or shatter my frontal vortex.  Slightly dizzy, my legs begin melting and I stagger a bit.  I hear a small involuntary moan escape my mouth: “uhhhh!!...”  I sound far away, like a distant recording of the last expulsion of air from a deflated balloon.  All this transpires in an instant.

“Shit!”  “Fucking hell!”  “Let’s get outta here!”  Terry, Walter and their buddy look frantically around to see if there are witnesses before taking off, and as quickly as the fire door hit the wall, they’re long gone.

Dazzling white fireworks are going off behind my eyelids in spastic flares. The pounding in my head synchronizes with the pounding in my hand and the sound is deafening. Leaning with my left shoulder against the wall, I look away from my right hand and steady my legs and my breathing. I just have to get to the school office which, at the moment, may as well be a thousand miles away.  Oh well - I’d planned on being late for class anyway.  I start walking towards the office, my breaths as slow as my pace, quiet tears streaming down my face.

~~~

After this, I’ll spend the rest of grade three in a full-arm cast to re-set all the bones up to my shoulder, and most of grade four attending weekly physiotherapy sessions to re-learn how to use my right hand.  Terry and his friends essentially leave me alone – save for minor insults, spits, kicks or shoves – for the rest of grade school.   At last, more or less, they’ve finally become bored of me. 

Home-free.

 EPILOGUE - Karma's Ricochet

“So, what ever happened to Terry?” my best friend emails me, after reading the nearly-final draft of this piece.  “Do you want to run him over?  I fucking do!”

My reply: “Last I saw, Terry ended up being an addict in the downtown east side.  I used to see him frequently when I volunteered at Spartacus Books (the old location, Cambie & Hastings, circa '96).  Ultimately I felt genuine pity for him.  He appeared entirely unprepared for the degree of adversity that had obviously descended in his life. I'm truly almost thankful to him and his minions - seven years as the target of their grade school cruelty blew goats, for sure, but did ultimately lay an exquisite foundation for me, in terms of  ‘hardship preparation.’  Small mercies.  LOL 

Perhaps I'll write a short epilogue and bring the whole piece around to some kind of profundity involving the immutability of Karma's ricochet, however long it takes to come around.  A good quote or something… ”

~~~