War Freaks

Middle school was a truly wretched time for me. Puberty had triggered bodily memories (i.e. I couldn't consciously remember) of my childhood rape, which meant that I was having regular panic attacks with no known cause. Every. Single. Girl. In existence. Tripped off some form of flashback or another. All of them. Especially if it was wrong or gross. The attacks from the neighborhood kids had reached a fever pitch, particularly on my siblings, and I found my pacifism was more than a little challenged. Some part of me had sworn peace and it could no longer justify the position, but didn't know what to move to instead.

And, in case anyone forgot, middle schoolers are some of the cruelest creatures that will ever exist. If any of you think you're a decent person I will ask you one question: "What were you like in middle school?"

Think long and hard before you answer. 

Middle School had rigid ideas about what was acceptable or not. This was mostly related to clothing, of course. Given I was dirt poor and a spastic mess (not to mention extremely small and sarcastic) I was towards the bottom of the social ladder. There were a few kids down there, who were particularly grungy and filthy types, whose homes were much worse than mine and were trying to be kind to each other in the hopes of preserving whatever soul they had left from their childhood. And we'd sit in our little corner table, talking about them, the cool kids who didn't let us have a moment to ourselves (which was untrue, in hindsight). But we were the kind ones, the good ones.

And then one day I got a set of cargo pants and the jocks talked to me for more than two seconds.

When my supposed friends came up to me to talk I shunned them. They were not dressed as I was. I had this involuntary revulsion, this twitch of the body as I became a part of something cool and they weren't. The reaction was outside of my control.

I lost something very important that day: my self-respect.

Because that day I realized that I wasn't really in control of my actions. And had never been. I'd been conditioned by something as simple as my clothing to reject people who had always been kind to me. I was a product of what others had decided upon. It didn't occur to me until later that my friends may have done the same in my shoes. I can hope that's not true, but I'll never know. I withdrew into my own shell after that, and didn't really come out for the rest of my time in middle school. I didn't want to be what others made me, I wanted to be free. And if that meant being alone then so be it.

I really wish I could tell you I learned that lesson right then and there. I really want to. I want to end it on a note of "This was the day I became a free-thinking individual". I want to so badly. But I can't. Because it's not true.

No no, I went and did worse. I could have bounced back from the clothes thing. That's silly, after all, at least in isolation. That doesn't suggest a problem.

At thirteen I got my first girlfriend. My mother thought it quite sweet. And who could blame her? Megan was a sweet girl. She had a gorgeous voice and wanted to become a professional singer. She certainly had the talent for it. And we got along! I mean, according to my own boyish egotistical way of thinking we did. She laughed at my jokes. She didn't look at me like pond scum. That was quite the step up for someone my age.

And then the cool kids caught wind of it. I think I was mocked in good spirit? From what I can remember it was an attempt at good fun. It certainly wasn't cruel. But I'd been so conditioned, so badly beaten, molested, harassed, broken, that I more than overreacted. I immediately broke up with Megan. Do not pass go. Do not collect 200 bucks. It couldn't have even been a day later. I dodged questions from my concerned mother about why I wasn't talking to Megan anymore. I hid in my room.

The story took an unanticipated turn, one of which we shall not go into here, beyond that I wound up living in my wife's family's forest, and was removed from having to see Megan, who happened to live up the street.

No, fuck it, we're talking about the flowers too.

Sorry folks, we're going back a second.

See, one day as I walked over to see Megan I saw a bunch of flowers in varying front yard gardens. They were gorgeous flowers. Me being the at-heart amoral person I am, I picked the ones I liked and had a beautiful bouquet to give her. She was absolutely delighted. But later she asked me if I had picked any of the flowers and, if I had, if I had asked permission. Because she walked by those gardens on her way to school and really liked them and wanted to make sure they were taken in good faith.

I opened my mouth to tell the truth. "Yeah, they really liked the idea!" my voice said. Wait, what??? "Totally cool with it." No, no, wait, what's going on???????

This is pertinent, because a few months later I was set to move to the Chicago area. Things had more or less fallen apart with the woman I was to marry later in life, an episode so painful that it would define my teenaged years. But, as I cleaned my room for one of the final times, I got the idea that I needed to call Megan.

She was not happy to hear from me. I opened my mouth. There was so much I wanted to tell her. How everything had managed to fall apart, that I had disappointed myself so thoroughly, that she deserved the truth about those damn flowers and a lot of other lies I'd found myself telling her and wondering why on God's green earth I'd done so. 

"Hey Megan, remember when I broke up with you?"

Just, what the hell, folks, what the hell.

"Yeah. I remember."

"Well, I'm leaving. I'm moving." It was all I could get out. I had no idea what on earth I was doing, this girl had never been anything but honest with me and here I was, twisting the knife instead of telling her the truth. I regretted being ugly to her, that I had always wanted to tell the truth but couldn't afford to lose her because of what I was. There was some seriously dark shit in my head, and I was afraid if one piece of the truth got out the rest would come tumbling out as well. 

And then I'd be alone.

Yes, there was a pause about this long on the phone.

"Okay. Bye."

That phone click still. STILL. Reverberates in my head. 

"But Nathan, you were thirteen! You're thirty-three now!" is what you are all saying now. You miss the point. Thirteen, thirty-three, one hundred and three, it happened. There was a total breakdown in my person, one in which I was merely a slave to something inside of me that caused me to be cruel. It is the privilege of the happy, the majority, to excuse cruelty. It is a prerequisite for being a part of any group, any social movement at all, that you will be cruel. Because of how we have chosen to organize society cruelty is unavoidable. And it is the fantasy of the marginalized that their marginalization makes them more virtuous. It certainly was for me. The instant we think our skin is on the line we turn on each other. It is a fact of human nature. And I promise you that you don't control it like you think you do.

I have since tried to instill an allergy into belonging to any group, for any reason, at all. Being in a group increases your capacity to be cruel. And I can't, just can't, do it again. Never again. When I was in highschool this manifested as me constructing my own social group, with people pulled from all social cliques. I refused to fit with anyone, and if I got too comfortable with a particular group I abandoned them quickly. They didn't seem to notice or mind; I never really fit anyway. But that's exhausting to do. I don't know if it's particularly healthy.

One day the church youth group went into Chicago, to give food to the homeless. The rest of the group was afraid of these dirty and stinky and sometimes crazy folks. I wasn't afraid of them, however. These were the faces of individuals who knew where they stood in the world and had accepted it. And were happy with it, even! How could I be afraid of them? If anything I admired them. They were what they were, in all their hideous glory. As we were handing out food one of them, a tall and skinny black man shouted out to me "HEY, BROTHER!"

I looked at him.

And I couldn't. I just couldn't. He was so damn happy, in that moment. I didn't envy him, I saw him as my better. He knew who he was and he was comfortable. He didn't feel the need to belong to anything, he was just himself. And he was free. And he was calling me his brother. He meant it. I felt that this man could see right into me. He saw it all. And he still called me brother.

Something inside of me breathed for the first time in awhile. I found that I had strode over to him. We hugged, tightly. It was like angel wings were around me. And for one second I felt the weight come off my soul. And I didn't have to question it. For once. And then he was walking away, food in hand, laughing and thanking me for the hug, that it had been a long time since someone had been nice to him like that. Everyone else was asking how the hell I could touch someone like that.

How could I not?

He had seen me.

How could I do anything else? After everything I'd done, involuntary though it was, to be given a chance like that? To have a real choice? Real choices don't come by often, folks. Believe me, I know quite well how rare actual moments of choice are. And what you do with them between the other things you don't actually have control over is what defines you.

Mercy is never to be turned down.