Well, once again, it is time to: “Kick out the jams!” which was song from back in the early 70s from a band called the MC5, so let’s get to it. And oddly enough, this constitutes my 13th post here for whatever significance that may pose to y’all. Y’all know that superstition is why some high rises do not have a floor named 13 for the elevators. This superstition has a name which is: Triskaidekaphobia.
Bullying is todays subject and what Dad did for me when I was being bullied in Bronxville, NY in high school as a freshman or sophomore. At this time, living in Manhattan, Mom and Dad decided that we should move again. Just like we did when we moved from a 5 acre place in Lake Oswego, Oregon to a three bedroom apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. So that is what we did. Granted, as a kid I never knew what prompted these moves except the ones that we did for Dad’s promotions. We only moved twice that was not caused by Dad’s promotions: one in a Lake Oswego and this one to Bronxville. The story goes like this:
when I was enrolled at the Browning School in Manhattan, I was doing reasonably well. Browning was known back then as a “prep school,” meaning you were there to prep for college, hence the word “preppie” when referring to a certain type of kid, at the time who was enrolled at such a type of school. There were other more famous prep schools but they were boarding schools meaning you would actually move there and attend school on-site and only travel home during holiday breaks but Browning was not like that. It was a college prep school that meant you attended daily classes while presumably living at home with your parents, not like some of the boarding schools. (Remember when we all were in Manhattan and they would not let us to tour the Browning School because they were renovating it at that time.) As I said, I was doing reasonably well there. I had friends to hang about with in Manhattan. We would do various things together which included making snowballs in the Winter and in a bit of anarchy, we would pelt limousines with a barrage of snowballs or we would attend a Broadway play together, more specifically, “Death of A Salesman” because none of us had read the assignment to read the play so since there was going to be a test the next day so we chose to watch the play the night before the test or we would nefariously and surreptitiously go off and smoke cigarettes together or we would just get together to hang out at each other’s parent’s places or we would just pal around with other while wandering around Manhattan. All this just to say that life with my buds from school was idyllic and a blast.
All that changed when we moved to Bronxville, The Sacred Square Mile. Back then, Bronxville was known as an exclusive area in which to buy a home. The town itself was only a square mile in acreage. It had it’s own schools, kindergarten through high school. It had it’s own downtown with shops and stores though it was tiny by comparison to other towns in Westchester County. And that meant if you lived within the confines of the Sacred Square Mile, you were in a exclusive and expensive club. I remember a Mom saying that we, as family, had to pass a “background check” as it is known now performed by the realtor or gatekeeper who would then bless your eligibility to buy a house within the Sacred Square Mile. So apparently we passed the background check and we’re graciously “allowed” to buy a house there which meant that I could enroll at Bronxville High School as a freshman or sophomore. I cannot remember which at this late date but if Mom were alive she could tell me.
Which reminds me of how great a Mom she was and I say this because whenever we would move, she was like an advance scout performing valuable recon about where and how we would move to a new town. She was incredible because if I remember correctly she left us in Lake Oswego, flew to New York and thoroughly reconned where we would go to school, where we would live and all the other things she did to ensure that we (all of us) would be properly taken care in the next move. She researched everything about the next move and then came back to us and told us how and where we would be living, where we would go to school etc.etc. To this day, I do not know how she acquired this ability but she was always spot-on, working tirelessly to insure that our family was taken care of. One of many reasons she was so fantastic as a Mom. And yes, if truth be told, I did lightly shove her once on the stairs in a fit of teenage testosterone-filled rage (in St. Louis) once but that is a story for another time and it should be noted here that that is the only time I ever became that mad at her. Once and only once.
All the rest of my growing up she was kind and thoughtful and always wanting the best for us and I knew it deep in my heart. She was simply the best Mom, at all times. While growing up and even as an adult, I completely and utterly knew she loved me and was proud of me and I loved her fiercely until she died and even after she passed, I still miss her deeply every day even though it has been 35 years that she has been gone. …….. one more thought about Mom…I am convinced that she chose to be gone in 1989 so she would not have to experience what y’all’s “mother” put me and Jennifer through during our divorce: the lying in Court, the bullying, the blackmail and the all-round despicable behavior of y’all’s “mother” …to this day, I am appalled at how badly she chose to behave during our divorce…y’all really have no idea how terrible and horrific she chose to be…
Moving on and we will just leave that there
Bronxville and bullying and how Dad saved me from a world of hurt which is the topic for today. So I have set the stage and now the story: I was a naive kid and basically, thought the best of everybody since that is always what I had known up until I got Bronxville High School. Boy Howdy, did I ever learn there that there are just mean people out there who will go out of their way to harass you and belittle you in any way they can so you feel as bad as they do. Granted, I had never run across anybody in my life to date, that behaved this way to me for no apparent reason. But I soon found out that I had acquired a tormentor who chose me for no apparent reason that I could discern. His name was Brian Harris and he was the de facto leader of the cool cats and kitties in Bronxville High School. He was a junior or senior, I cannot remember. Unbeknownst, to me, I had somehow incurred his wrath and Boy Howdy did he pile it on every chance he got. I have since learned that he is dead and gone so I outlived him. A small but significant victory if I do say so myself. His bullying continued even on the football team where we both played. So finally, I confessed all of this to my Dad one day, crying my eyes out to him. I was a wreck and told Dad about all the unrelenting abuse I was taking from this cat on a daily basis. I went on and on about this to Dad. Finally, once I had cried it out with him, Dad paused and spoke to me with kindness in his heart for what I was going through and asked me the following question:
”In five years, are you going to care about Brian Harris and what is he doing to you right now?”
I can tell you right now when I heard Dad’s question to me it was as if a lightning bolt went off in my head and heart. Dad’s question rocked me to the bone because I knew he was right. I would not care in five years about this cat and the wave of relief that washed over me was immense. I knew immediately as Dad said those words that I would not care about him and his constant bullying of me in five years time. The relief I felt was deep and looking back on my life, I was able to see that Dad’s words to me that day had informed and guided me and my subsequent life profoundly. In other words, those words by Dad that day had altered my subsequent life path. So from that day forward, I began to see the world differently and I was able to see that in a very real sense, I did NOT have to dwell on this cat’s behavior to me or anyone else’s behavior.
There is a song by the Jefferson Airplane called “Eskimo Blue Day” that I first heard when I was 22 yo and that song lyric reinforced what Dad had told me that day and it goes like this:
That’s why you might know what I mean
Consider how small you are
Compared to your scream
The human dream
Doesn’t mean shit to a tree
This is the last verse in the song but what I heard in that song was the refrain: “Doesn’t mean shit to a tree” and how that line kinda in retrospect informed my life thereafter. These were Dad’s words in a different format but still saying the same thing. In life, Gents, you make choices every day and you can choose to let those choices be yours and yours alone and damn the consequences because ultimately those choices don’t mean shit to tree or in five years, you will not care about what is happening to you, right now. You can choose how you let life’s up and downs affect you or not. Dad and the Jefferson Airplane are saying the same thing. I have said it here before but it bears repeating here.
I learned a long time ago to not care about what others think of me
And what I think doesn’t mean shit to a tree
Well that about wraps it up for now. I hope I have made it clear about how Dad’s words affected me as a teenager and later on, how I got a reinforcement from the Universe later on in life from the Jefferson Airplane lyric.
“Onwards, thru the fog,” as Oat Willie sez.