to katie: about teasing

At some point, most kids get teased about one thing or another. It seems like almost everyone gets teased in middle school eventually. Here is my idea about why that is: middle school is a good time to figure out what you like and don't like about friends, clothes, music, all kinds of stuff. And sometimes, if you don't know what you like and don't like, one fast way to tell is to make fun of something and see if other people join in making fun of it, or if they say "Hey, I like that, don't make fun of it."

The problem is, everyone in middle school is figuring out what they like and don't like, and sometimes people join in teasing because it's easier than standing up to your friends, so kids sometimes end up making fun of things that they actually like later when they stop to think about it. It can certainly be confusing and upsetting.

I know, because there were two groups of kids who made fun of me in middle school. But the good news is that I made some great friends, people who are still my friends today, more than 20 years later. And I have some wonderful memories of my middle school years. But those stories are for another letter.

This letter is about my stories of getting teased in middle school. Names have been changed so I won't accidentally embarrass their kids if they happen to read this someday.

Alex and the Grab

Alex was a kid who grew up to be a talented musician. When we were in high school, we were friends and went to parties together. But when we were in sixth grade together, he teased me and embarrassed me. This is the story of Alex and the Grab.

Alex was a kid that some other kids picked on, because he was a little different. His family was very artistic, and they let him dress however he wanted. In his case, that meant that he wore clothes that were a little bit more colorful than what the rest of us wore, and he painted his fingernails black sometimes. And he was very very good in music and art classes.

From my perspective, here's what happened: Alex came up out of nowhere and grabbed my rear end. I got very upset. A teacher asked me why I was upset. I told the teacher that Alex had grabbed my rear end. Alex got in trouble. End of story.

About five years later, when we were in high school, Alex told me his side of the story.

Back when I went to middle school, kids would make fun of you if you were a boy who liked boys or a girl who liked girls. I don't know if kids still make fun of other kids for that reason - I certainly hope not, but they probably still do.

Anyway, Alex was a boy who liked girls. In fact, Alex was a boy who liked me. A lot. He would write songs about me, and write poems for me, and draw paintings that he thought I would like. But he never had the courage to tell me that he liked me.

So one day, some "friends" of Alex's were teasing him by saying that Alex liked boys. I don't know why. Alex said they were wrong, that he liked girls, not boys. Then one of the boys teasing Alex said, "Prove you like girls by grabbing some girl's butt." This idea did not make Alex very happy, because he was pretty sure he would get in trouble.

Sadly for Alex, one of the kids in that group also knew that Alex liked me, so he said, "No, Alex, you should prove that you like Angie by grabbing Angie's butt."

Poor Alex. At that point, either his friends would think he liked boys, or he would do something bad to the girl he liked. Either choice was not a good choice for him, so he ran up to me and grabbed my rear end.

Of course, then I made it worse for him by being upset, and then by telling on him. He felt horrible. And he still liked me, but he decided then that I would probably never like him, so he did not tell me until years later.

When he did finally tell me his side of the story, it was our junior year in high school. He signed my yearbook and picked a page way on the inside with a lot of white space on it, and he filled up with the story. It ended with, "I thought for sure that you would hate me, but you never did. Sure, you stayed away from me for a couple of weeks, but after that, you always treated me normal. I had a big crush on you, but I was too scared to talk to you, for four whole years. Then this year, I have a girlfriend so I was not in love with you anymore, and we became friends in choir. And the nicest surprise was that you were just as nice and funny as I had always imagined you would be. I'm just sad we didn't get to be friends earlier."

I read it and gave him a big hug and we laughed about the whole thing. Our senior year, he played one of the songs that he had written for me, in front of a bunch of our friends who knew the whole story, and it was a beautiful song. We all loved it, even his girlfriend.

Billy and the Weeks of Teasing

But much worse than Alex and The Grab was Billy and the Weeks of Teasing.

From my point of view, here's what happened: When Billy and I were in fourth grade together, our teacher used to choose the two of us to go run special errands for her, and we both got teased for being the teacher's pets. When we were in seventh grade, out of nowhere, he and his friends started teasing me about being a good-two-shoes (which meant that I always followed all the rules and somehow that was supposed to be bad). It seemed like Billy was leading the group.

At first, I did not let it get to me much. Sure, I was annoyed that he was making fun of me, but I was not too upset. But it kept going on - for weeks and weeks. Usually he would find me right after school and make fun of me in front of his friends and my friends, so I would go home mad and upset. My friends were great - they would tell me that he was being dumb and not to pay attention to him, but after a while, it just made me upset. After about four weeks, I started just going straight to my room and crying after school.

My mom, your gramma, usually did not worry too much about teasing. She would just say, "Oh, honey, why do you think someone would be mean like that?" and we would talk about it and I would usually feel better. But Billy's teasing had gotten very mean - he was saying that nobody would ever like me because I was too much of a Christian and too much of a goodie goodie, and so nobody would ever like me (Now remember, at that time, I did not know that Alex had a big secret crush on me). And when I started coming home and crying every day, she started to get worried, so she asked me to tell her exactly what Billy was saying to me. I told her, and she decided that enough was enough and it was time to call Billy's parents and let them know.

Now here's the thing about Billy's parents: Billy's dad was a minister. Billy, in fact, helped out with church services on Sundays - he would sometimes get to read scripture from the front and stuff like that. Billy and his dad talked about God and Christianity all the time, and Billy's dad thought that Billy liked Christianity.

Now here's the other thing about Billy's parents, and this part is really, really cool. When they were really mad at their kids, instead of yelling at them, Billy's parents would make up a questionnaire, like a test, and send them to their rooms to fill it out. Well, Billy's dad was super-mad about what Billy had said to me, because he didn't want Billy to be mean, and he didn't want Billy to be saying bad things about Christianity, so his parents made up a questionnaire and sent him to his room.

Here were the questions Billy had to answer: (1) What does it mean to treat people with respect? (2) What does it look like to be mean to someone? (3) How are men supposed to behave toward women? (4) If your friends are picking on someone or teasing them, how are you supposed to behave? (5) Why have you been so mean to Angie Reeves? (6) What do you think is the right way to treat Angie Reeves?

Well, he sure knew what he was in trouble for! By the time he finished filling out the answers to the questions, he felt very bad about what he had done. He told his parents that when we were in fourth grade, we were both teacher's pets, and we both did everything right at school. But then when we got into middle school, classwork got harder for Billy, and he started getting B's and C's, but I was still getting A's, and it seemed to Billy that school was easy for me.

Right before Billy started being mean to me, he found out that he was not going to be able to be in the Honors Math classes anymore, that he was going to be in the Regular Math classes from now on, and he was very angry about that. He started taking his anger out on me, even though I had not done anything to him at all. He felt guilty about it, but he kept doing it because his friends expected him to, but he did not think it was funny anymore.

Billy's parents told him that I had been going home crying every day after school, and Billy felt very very bad and said that he wanted to tell me that he was sorry. Then Billy's very smart parents did a very smart thing: they let him choose how to apologize to me. Either he could write me a letter, or he could call me on the phone, or he could tell me in person.

And then Billy did something very brave: he chose to tell me he was sorry in person, at school, in front of all of my friends, and also in front of all of his friends too. In fact, he made sure that all his friends were there when he came over to me. What he said to me was, "I've been really mean to you lately. It's because I was jealous that you make A's and I don't. I'm really sorry." I had already heard from Mom about the questions that Billy's parents had made him answer, so I knew the story, so I was not surprised that he apologized, but I was very surprised that he apologized in front of everyone. I said, "It's ok, Billy, thanks," and he was always very nice to me after that.

Billy and I also became friends when we were in high school. In fact, one summer, we saw each other when I was out riding bikes, and neither of us had anything to do that afternoon, so he came over to swim, and we kissed! We kind of kissed because we were bored more than we kissed because we were really attracted to each other, but it was nice for both of us. Everybody had forgiven everybody for everything.

Billy went from being a very nice teenager to being a very nice man, and in fact, he is now a minister too, like his dad was! And I bet he teaches his kids not to tease.

The Moral of the Stories

Most people don't ever know why someone is teasing them - I am very very lucky that I know Alex's side of the story, and that I know Billy's side of the story. Both of those situations could have ended up where I never knew why they were mean to me.

I think everyone got picked on in middle school. My group of friends, girls who didn't have boyfriends until high school, were called goodie-goodies. Girls who had boyfriends were called boy-crazy. Kids who did sports were called dumb jocks. Kids who were popular were called snobs. Kids who played chess or dungeons & dragons or liked computers were called nerds. Kids who liked punk music or Prince were called freaks. So I think, at one point or another, everybody had to learn to deal with it.

When people tease you for no reason, it is almost always because of something bad going on in their life, instead of being something about you. They are probably hurt or upset, or being teased themselves.

The important thing to remember is that it does no good to be mean back. That just starts a bad circle - they're mean to you, so you're mean to them, so they're mean back to you... That can go on forever, and you are both just mean, and you run the risk that your friends will stop liking you because you're not a nice person. That's no good.

Usually, the right response to someone who is teasing you is to try to stay away from them, and to feel kind of sorry for them. It's sad that someone would be so insecure or angry or hurt that they would be mean to other people just to feel okay about themselves. Of course, if it goes on for a while and becomes upsetting, tell your parents or a teacher you trust.

Or, you can always call me, and I'll tell you the stories of Alex and Billy, and we can wonder together whether or not the person picking on you really has a secret crush on you.

Love,
Aunt Angie