Bullied and Moving On

 I was bullied first through 6th grade very badly. Then our three grade school combined in one jr high and I made some friends. It didn't totally stop but it was way better. Then finally I graduated and moved to a new town for college. I wasn't bullied there but I expected it so much I was really shy and never approached people first. 

Good luck finding those first few steps away from the group that bullies you. They may think they are the whole world but they are not even a drop in the ocean.

I never went back for reunions at my grade school-high school town but a couple of the worst tormentors in grade school have contacted me on-line and apologized and let me know that it is a guilt they have lived with and that they aways kew what was happening was wrong. That means the world to the little girl who still hides inside me even now.

I have been hearing a lot about bullying.  We all have. I know some of the students I see call everything bullying, and it is NOT. But there is a lot of bullying and it can't be ignored or it only gets worse, and the impact from being bullied lasts a life time.

Why do I think it is not all bullying?  Because, having been bullied, and yes, at times having been a bully, I know some of the differences between true bullying and just ordinary bad moments.

I believe that a lot of times when a student claims that they are being bullied, they are really just having one of those sad, frustrating days where kids learn how to get along with other people, where they practice the give and take and learn the empathy and co-operation skills necessary to live as part of a society.  It may bring tears when your "Best Friend" suddenly tells you that she wants to play with someone else, It may hurt your feelings when your classmates laugh at the clothing you chose for the day, and it may make you mad if the kid eating his flaming hot cheetos at lunch refuses to share. However, those are not bullying.

To be bullying, it has to be purposefully targeted at you, and it will probably be ongoing and is usually not just one person because the true bully likes a cowed audience of followers along for the entertainment.  It will probably hit at your weakest area, bullies are good at seeing what those are.

See this girl, awkward yes, different than most of my classmates, true, but not as ugly and stupid and obviously bad as I believed at the time.

True bullying makes you believe everyone else sees the reason you were targeted. It makes you believe there is no escape, that everyone is on the side of those tormenting you, and that those who you could ask for help won't be able to do nothing.  It isolates you and makes you feel like asking for help will only increase the abuse that you must somehow deserve.

Not everyone who bullies you is the primary instigator.  Some will just be almost as weak as you and be afraid that if they speak up the attack will turn on them. It is hard for anyone to willingly volunteer for that kind of abuse and it takes courage and the ability to see that bullies are afraid of groups. There is strength in numbers if other people can join together, which is precisely what the bully wants to avoid.

In grade school I started first grade not really knowing how to relate to other kids. I had a lot of grandparents, great-grandparents, great-Aunts and Uncles, but no siblings until just before I started school. I was severely pigeon-toed and the Dr. ordered dance classes but I failed drastically at dancing when I could barely walk. I was freckled and loud and tried to argue with the teacher who was teaching us to spell wrong, when I had started school already knowing how to read.  The class was using a phonetic program that taught that school was spelled "Skwl" and I knew better.  Cat was not Kat no matter what the teacher said. Not a good candidate for ITA learning!

In grade school, I had a battle every day. My things were stolen and destroyed or passed around from child to child with great drama and screams of "Dixie Fleas! Pass it on!"  They pretended to spray my chair with disinfectant before anyone else would sit there.  I came to believe I really did stink.  I started not doing homework just so I could be kept after school so the kids who threatened to beat me up as I walked home would get bored and be gone.

When I was chased to my house and tried to hide between the screen door and the locked inner door as 4 older girls threatened to kill me, my mom drove up. In sweet voices they told her that "we don't know what is wrong. We came by and she was just crying."  Mom thanked them for trying to help and I claimed I had just had a horrible head-ache.

Once I went to Jr. high it got better, and I had some friends from the other grade schools, but I still had kids who stole my PE clothes or cornered me and smeared raw eggs in my hair and poured cans of soda on me.  Pretty girls would catch my eye and I would stare back, wondering what they knew that made them accepted, that I was missing, then they would snarl at me to stop staring.

I never quite got it right. Once the High School held an anti-bullying assembly with a movie about a boy who tried so hard to be invisible that he stepped off the bus and died of a heart-attack and when the school tried to find his friends, none of his classmates knew who he was.  More kids told me "Hello" after that assembly than ever before but it only lasted a day.  I too was learning to hide, I carried a book and sketch pad and I hid behind them all the time.  I ate lunch in the art room and went straight home after school. I tried to be aloof so no-one would be able to tease me that no-one wanted to be my friend.  

It made me a bad friend to the people who really were trying, because I was afraid it was a trap and then they would laugh, and I was convinced I really didn't deserve a friend anyway.

How did I learn to move on?

First I had to move on.  I could never have become the loving friend and Mom and wife and teacher and writer that I am now, had I stayed in that town.  When I went away, I literally kept my head down and made no eye contact, and could not believe those other kids on the college campus were talking to me when they said "Hi"  It took a lot of them to make me understand that there wasn't some scarlet letter branding me an outcast. Then it took one very confident and loving friend to keep holding on even when I pushed away, and another, and the man who loved me and married me, and kept insisting I was a treasure.  It took seeing my worth in a lot of other peoples eyes before I could see it in the mirror.

It took leaving home and creating my own home. It took living overseas in China for awhile and being in the minority and still making friends

So then I became a teacher of special ed. children and a Mom of loving men, and a writer of novels that are anti-bullying pro-loving and I have made a conscious choice to add to the love in this world

So now school is starting again, and kids will be bullied again. What can we all do?  Love each other, hold a hand, offer a smile and a validation of worth, refuse to be silent audiences any longer. Ask for and offer help.

There is more good than bad people in the world.  That is why the bad ones are the news and the good ones are the norm.

Only So Much Imagination

 Lately I have been wondering why the very idea of writing, which I love, makes me feel blank and stalled and like weeping.  I stare out the window and finally jump up and grab a mop or my camera or my car keys and head anyplace but the keyboard.

 Looking at my life at the moment however, reveals a simple answer and gives me permission to tell myself that this is temporary and I can relax about it.

 I usually substitute teach, and yet I have been subbing full time for the last quarter of this school year, in a very difficult class with 8 students and 7 assistants to deal with.  I love the kids, but they kick, pinch, bite and spit on me.  I love the assistants but they need directing, and have schedules to balance and inter-relationships that work or not as the situations come up.

 I have been struggling to create situations at school where everyone gets along without feeling stressed to the point of exploding and honestly, that requires a lot of imagination. And I have been creating art projects to teach them and doing my own 365Project photography, and dealing with a very broke time of our life. Money and old everything, house, cars, clothing add stress and require more creative solutions.

My husband and I just had our 29th anniversary and our hundredth battle over my own agoraphobic tendencies.  I love that guy and his patience with me, but his patience tends to evaporate just when wqe are most overwhelmed and my courage is at its lowest, of course.

 Then I have aging Mom and aging friends and suddenly everyone I care about seems to have health issues to deal with, and my kids are young, just post high school adults who need support as the parents also need it, and that requires more imagination and a lot of love and patience, and exhaustion.

Yeah, I know, It is not called the sandwich generation without cause. I just wish my sandwich had less jam right now.

Some days I don't even consider writing, or promoting the three books that are out there neglected, on the shelf.  Then I feel guilty. Everything makes me feel guilty lately.  Then I get a exhausting day, and I'm walking out to my car and a teacher tells me, "Hey, our bookclub wants to pick your book to read. The Oregon Trail one?  Would you be up for coming to talk to us, Say in October?"

I smile, and laugh and say, "I'd be honored."

and realize once again, that everything that exhausts me, also recharges me in a wonderful cycle.

Life IS Good.

Rays of Sunshine

     February is a month that always seems to slow me down and wear me out and leave me back in the bog of depression which I usually manage to avoid most of the year.  The cold that seeps into my bones and never leaves has settled in quite deeply by February, meaning that is I have any free time, I use it sitting by the wood stove, under blankets, or in a bath tub of very hot water.

 Even when the sun is up, there is often an all day fog or cloud cover that keeps it from feeling like there is any light.

 And I tend to make very bad choices about what to eat.  I might as well have an IV line from the coffee pot to my brain, with a plate of sugar always at my side.  I hibernate and give in to depression and the little things like the normal ebb and flow of income versus bills suddenly feels overwhelming.

 So this year I have made it through January with a bit more energy and a few more smiles than a lot of years.  i have taken my camera outside and played with the different modes, and walked my son's dog and worked a lot for the school district.

 I have no written much, or at all really, the blog sits there taunting me with the fact that the daily readers are reading posts I put up years ago, but not finding anything new.

 I need to work on the book I started in November and on the research for the next Double Time novel, because they will never be as familiar to me again, as the Oregon trail one was.

 I think we have been living with "Dementor Weather."  It has been cold and foggy and sucks the warmth and hope right out of me, but then along comes a beam of sunlight and I find that there is still some promises left to raise my hopes and eyes to the future again.

I need the equivalent of an Elizabethan Collar to keep me from digging at those thoughts that keep me feeling listless and sad.  I need to remember that the hibernation urge is a real part of the annual cycle and will be forgotten again in the spring sunshine.  I need to remember that there is purpose and growth in the dark, sleepy days and a conserving of energy to allow us to keep going another year.

I have goals that I set at the beginning of the year, and I've made progress on them.  I've paid the bills for one month after another, somehow.  I've been surrounded by wonders and people who love me.  Life is Good actually pretty great, and sometimes you just have to focus on what you have before you miss it and it becomes what you had instead.

Setting Goals for 2013

Here are my New Year's Resolutions for 2013

This year I chose things I know I will get better at, because they are important to me, and because I am already making progress on them, I have written 3 1/2 books, and I have lost 40 pounds and given up soda and started adding in lots of random acts of fitness thanks to Jonathan Roche and The No Excuses Workouts.

I do live in a beautiful place where getting outside is a Joy

I do Treasure my Family but the miles between us makes it a bit more effort to keep those connections alive now. 

Balance, Well, sometimes, but not so much in my bank balance, so that is the focus this year.

 Do I love New Year's and the Resolutions to do things differently and better?  Well, yes and no.  Rather than going out to a party, I love going inside with my journal and reading notes and essays and lists from previous years. But I see that a lot of the things stay the same from year to year without change.  That is good and bad.  It means I hold the same values but also that I have the same problems. A couple of times I have followed the suggestion I saw years ago in a "Better Homes and Gardens" magazine that suggests not writing what you want to do, but making a list of 100 things you tolerate, small things that sap your time and energy if you don't deal with them.  That has worked well for me, I can always go back and check off several that I did deal with and feel empowered even as I move some to the new list.  I have gotten rid of a lot of the specific piles of clutter I've written about and done some of the maintenance tasks on house and car and marriage, because, yep, even after 30 years together, there needs to be time and effort in maintaining that closeness, especially as out role changes from family with children, to couple with grown adults who sometimes visit.

 Last year I chose only one thing to focus on, one small three letter word that I wanted to have be at the heart of the first and last thoughts in my mind every day. JOY!  That was a wonderful change in attitude for me because I often tended to walk around with a cloud of worries and anger.  Now i habitually find the good before The bad thoughts even start. If I panic over the money, I start to breath and tell myself, "for today, you have everything you need, yesterday you did too, trust that you will Tomorrow as well."

 So I have found Joy and beauty all around me, even in the worn and abandoned house down the street.  It is lovely in a strange, mysterious way I think.

 This year I am looking with Wonder on the giant stumps on the former Redwood logging camp land where I live, and thinking of how things change over time, but how those changes can let in the sun and bring wonder and growth too.

I see my blind dog trusting that he is safe if one of us is near and realize that we are a lot like that dog, we don't see all the things that are in out world, but if we can trust that we will be Ok, we usually will be.

So a year of Joy, Wonder, Balance and Storytelling for me. Blessings to you,


Love,

 Dixie

Moving On

 Time, the way it changes things and the way the important things remain unchanging in the face of the passage of time, is the underlying theme in the book, Double Time On The Oregon Trail, and in my life.  Lately we have been very focused on waiting for a date we both anticipated and dreaded.  Our son, and the daughter of our heart, were moving away to start their first year of college.  The time seemed to both drag slowly and fly by as other people their age started at schools on the semester system and they waited for a class that didn't begin until Sept. 27.

 Then they were hired to work at the dining hall and their arrival time moved up to September 18, but we still had lots of wonderful days to watch movies and eat big meals and play at the river. And then there was no more time. We were loading the van and driving and driving and driving and realizing that it is a long, long way to anywhere from Del Norte County California.

There were hugs and tears and a last day exploring around the San Francisco, Tiburon, Great Highway area and then more hugs and tears and SMILES.  There is so much joy in seeing babies turn into wonderful people, and seeing impossible dreams become reality.

 I have not written much in the last month, but now there will be time, and I have been lucky enough that some people are starting to discover my books.  I had a teacher of a 5th grade class order a class set of the Oregon Trail book.  I was thrilled by that of course, then I came home to find that "Lisa Day on the Web" had posted an excellent review of the book too.

http://lisaday.weebly.com/4/post/2012/09/double-time-on-the-oregon-trail.html

 It is funny, sending your kids to college, and publishing your book are two things with a lot in common.  You put so much time and love and effort into both writing a book and raising a baby, and then you offer it up to the world and open your hands and wait to see what happens. You hope that you have built it a strong enough bridge that it can move on into the rest of the world and find welcome and love and success.

The 2 pairs of Pants Deal

I had to take a month off line because the hard drive in my computer died, and then I found out what a gift that was as I spent a great family winter break, talking and going for walls and being with family and friends. I barely missed the on-line addictions but I am back now and eager to look for JOY in 2012, I have decided that my focus word for the year has to be "Joy" as that is the one thing I have been struggling with my whole life, I tend to look for the problems first instead of seeing all the great things around me.

So, life is mostly great, even though money, not so much.

Sometimes I am joking, but always half serious when I say that I think I made an agreement before I was born.  I think the deal was what I call the "2 pairs of pants" deal.  I only ever manage to have 2 good pairs of pants at once, then if I buy more, one tears or I spill paint on it.  Same with every necessary thing, If I get extra money, my water heater dies or my tires need replaced and it and costs that exact amount.  But also, I never seem to go without what I need, so if the rent is due and I am broke there will be an unexpected gift, or job,
 or tax return and the exact amount will be there.  I do feel like the Lily in the field who might as well not worry because the worrying changes nothing
except how I view my world and whether I notice the Joy in it.

The great thing is, there is abundance in my life, and it is in the things way more important than money.  I have lived my life surrounded by those who love me and by beauty and by opportunities to be with great people in wonderful parts of the world



so this year, while I strive to move that scale, and to add to the bank balance, or at least to pay the bills, I am going to Trust that Joy will be there.

Every Day.