Odd Girl Out

Odd Girl Out - Reflection

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I’ve been ‘unpopular’ and ‘weird’ ever since third grade. In fact, people used to think I was mentally disabled. Halfway through my third grade year I moved and had to go to a brand new school with faces I’d never seen before. I was basically a loner for the entire year except for brief interactions with my classmates, and there was one girl whose name I don’t remember. She had short red hair and lots of freckles, and she was a very confused girl. There was another girl who had short brown hair who was tall and was constantly getting into fights with the girl with red hair. Whenever they fought the red-head would consult me and we would be like best friends until she made up with the brunette- then I was the enemy. They would joke and make fun of me, along with a large group of other girls at the school. It was at those times that I would feel the most isolated, cut-off from my peers.

I didn’t actually have a real group of my own until middle school. In seventh grade I had a small but close group of friends consisting of about six or seven people. I was unbothered for most of seventh grade, and the first couple months of the next year, my last year, my eighth grade year. I had developed a new friend, closer than any of the others, but along with her came the burden of bullies- and lots of them. People I had dealt with but ignored before who had mostly ignored me in return were now attacking me and my friend.

For most of eighth grade I chose to laugh at these people. My friend and I made ourselves feel better by poking fun at them, telling ourselves that they were all idiots and that we were the ‘cool’ ones. But there was one boy that really got to my nerves, really made my teeth grind. At one point it became physical, and after that he left me alone for quite a while. But then he started bothering my friend and me again, talking to us when he knew we didn’t like him.

There was also a small group of seventh graders that harassed us for most of the year; three of them. It started when I rescued a worm from murder and they called me a freak. What I didn’t know at the time was that they walked home the same way I did with my friend… They constantly shouted things at us as they rode past on their bikes, and sometimes they would stop in the middle of the sidewalk, forcing us to walk into the street to get around. At one point they followed us, running into the backs of our legs with their tires.

The worst part about it is that they only did these things for the same reason that my friend and I would poke fun at the bullies in our own grade- to make themselves feel better. They wanted security, a higher status, and we were just perfect targets to get what they wanted. It was almost as if we just stepped up to be their enemies.

Bullying has been part of history since apes first stood on two feet. It used to consist of one ape shoving another, one ape throwing rocks at another, or a group of apes shunning another ape. Bullying has stayed with us, complicating itself and twisting itself to turn into things like blackmail, torture, murder, rape, and others. Bullying has always been a way of making oneself feel better. By bringing others down your position in life increases. In fact, politics have a lot of bullying in them if you think about it. Spreading rumors as a way to make the other candidate look bad, using secrets against them. Bullying is almost a necessary part of human existence. War, religion, and politics are heavily discussed every day on the media, a weapon used to backstab others.

Modern day bullying in school seems to have flourished. Instead of just stealing money and lunches and beating scrawnier kids into the dust, people have developed more… refined ways of doing things. There’s always the classic whispering to each other and continuously glancing at the target then laughing as they walk past. There’s posting cruel and (hopefully) untrue things about the target online (Facebook, anyone?). But these things aren’t the worst of it. Some are clever enough to set up humiliating stages- like telling someone their crush likes them back and that the person wants to talk to them. The target, who is too blind to wonder why this particular person that they don’t know much about other than the fact that they’re not always very nice, goes after their crush. Then, in the middle of a large crowd, the target will say his or her feelings out loud… And their crush will reject them.

With boys it isn’t as bad. Teenage boys are still in a time of “I don’t like you so I’m going to shove you and steal your money”. It’s the teenage girls that must be kept an eye on. Gossip, rumors and lies are possibly the worst part of middle school- especially when a rumor was started that’s true and you find out that it was started by someone you trust. That’s when it really stings. Sure you begin to feel desperate when everyone is being mean, but when you thought you knew someone, thought they were your friend, thought they were someone you could rely on, that’s when it aches.

In my years of high school I look forward to being able to relax from bullying for a while. I’m hoping that, at least for a time, people my age can be kind and considering to each other and that people don’t gang up on others. In the next four years I will remember to be kind to everyone, especially the people who don’t really have anyone else. Everyone deserves to have at least someone on their side.