How wrong she was, not to fall apart, not to fade away, not to die wretchedly
On she went, unmindful of chattering twits or twittering chats aimed at her
Why do you exist? Why suck our air? Leave us! Leave us! We are uncomfortable!
Always it is the same, for the one, the sad one. the lone one, even so in crowds
Color, it doesn’t matter Intelligence only makes it less bearalble Sex no protector.
Surely they would have loved her better if she’d have broken down and cried out
Or if she’d have dumbed herself down several shades to match classmates
How dare she? Doesn’t she know we are children of lawyers, judges, officers?
Why does she raise her head so high, her grade so high, in our presence?
You are nothing, you are worthless, you should kill yourself for our sake!
Hmm, she thought, through the pain: if nothing I am, then why do you bother?
How wrong she was
Actually, I started writing this out of annoyance in regards going to court and being accused of being the predominant cause of lack of communication between me and my Ex – as if .. well, I can’t tell you what might have really been the cause of it, because that would be being less than nice and get me in trouble.
All I can do is to change the subject and tell you to watch American Psycho, Sleeping with the Enemy, and .. .err. .whatever that Jennifer Lopez movie is. Then jam them all together in your mind and ask yourself : Would I have trouble communicating with that conglomerate man?
However, this is not about court, my Ex, or those movies. This is about before that, grade school nastiness that, for some of us, never stops.
kerryone, about 1 month ago
Indeed! “leave us! leave us! we are uncomfortable!” Why is this so true? So difficult to fathom even as we understand the the process is happening but cannot grasp the intangible nature of the fear, just the constant dull pressure of others unease.
Arletta in reply to kerryone’s comment, about 1 month ago
Well, unease is one thing .. violent oppression out of a fear of being like someone, or not being as good as someone for that matter, is a much nastier thing.
There was a sub-story to something I was reading (can’t remember now if it was Roots or Uncle Tom’s Cabin, but it was one of them) about slavery, wherein one of the slaves proved to be very intelligent, hard working, and respected for those traits by everyone he was hired out to.
His Master could have let him buy his freedom, or he could have sat back and enjoyed the money the slave was bringing in. Instead, he decided to break him and ruin all the joy in his life, because the slave was better at the same kind of work as the Master also did.
Though that is not the only reason people act that way. You know, my son got picked on by teacher’s , a lot, due to the color of his skin. Strangely, he was white and so were they.. but the school was predominantly black, then Vietnamese, then Alaskan Native. They had to release their frustrations on someone and he was the only person in most of the classes that was not represented in the country by a large group that would sue the pants off them if they singled him out. The teachers that were black and Alaskan Native treated him with respect. Go figure!