This got me to thinking.
My brother got bullied a lot in school, but he brought a good portion of it on himself. In grade school, he was rather small for his age and made up for it with his rather large and obnoxious mouth. We O'Bannions are masters of creative insultery, and Slim was a prodigy... A Mozart of smart-ass comments practically begging for a kick in the cojones or a fist in the face. It wasn't quite as a bad as the whole Billy Wolfe thing, but it wasn't really all that different from any ADD kid who has experienced more than their fair share of toughening up. My mom was never pleased when it happened, after all, what parent would be if their child had a black eye? However... to find out that your son provoked said black eye by making a fat joke about his mother. Repeatedly. Taunting the Bully. "Your mama... your mama... your mama..."

My brother has never been very good at shutting his mouth when he needs to, and suffice it to say, it happened all the time. His Freshman year of highschool, he went from being 5'1 to 6'2 and he discovered weed and weight lifting. A weird combination to be sure, but it made my obnoxious little brother become a lot more mellow and a lot less likely to be targeted. His mouth? Well... some things never change.

We all knew those kids in school whose parents were a little bit too involved, or who made Mount Everest out of every insignificant molehill, whether there was really a mole in there or not. The sad thing is, this only provokes Bullies, and leads to more opportunities to have your child ostracized. I don't make the rules, the playground makes the rules, and quite frankly, I don't think it's changed much. A majority of us were bullied in some way by someone. Boys turn to fists, but black eyes heal. Girls are far more cruel in their bullying. Girls are evil, and we go for the jugular. Emotional bullying, the manipulative sort, sticks with you for years if you're the victim of it, long after the scars from physical bullying have faded.

I would have died if my parents had any involvement in my own personal Bully Trials! I was the quiet and contemplative sort (what the fuck happened?), and I also had the misfortune of being smart, creative, and more than a little weird (awwww-yeaaah!). I might as well have had a bullseye on my forehead. I only got in one actual fight (totally not my fault), but I think we all know how terrible little girls can be. Having my parents involved would have accomplished nothing. It would have ostracized me even further. It's not the same as being punched in the mouth I realize, but the experience for each one of us as kids still hurts us just the same. I'm a better person for it, and much more assertive than I would have been if I hadn't been knocked around a little bit.

Yeah... I was voted to be removed from the lunch table a couple of times. I won my way back in through sheer cleverness. Our school cafeteria had a loose definition of what dessert was. One day, we were served a white cake with frosting that bore an uncanny resemblance to paste. We joked a bit about it, and to test the theory, I grabbed my whole piece of cake, and with a bit of a flourish, decided to see if it would stick to the wall. Ta-Da!!!! It did. I was back in! I got clean-up duty and a detention, but it was totally worth it. This kind of Heidistuff was how I overcame a lot of my bullies. By a little bit of daring and cleverness, you can do a lot of things. In high school, I overcame the Mean Girls through fashion. They may not of liked me, but... they did think my outfit was cute. Art nerds don't like fashion. Confusion abounded! I was more or less embraced or left alone by the Mean Girls as my wardrobe evolved. You've just got to work with what you have. I had a small allowance, and a gift for prowling the clearance rack.

I suppose we all have bully tales, and mine or my brothers are certainly not unique. We all get around it in our own ways, although for some it's harder than others. I feel bad for a lot of kids who do get bullied unmercilessly, but most of us have been at some point. It's not unique, and on a not terribly damaging scale, it just might be part of growing up.