8th Grade Hell: a Bullying Incident

After I wrote my adoption post a couple of weeks ago I started thinking over my other memories on the subject. I came up with one that’s more about bullying than adoption. It was the culminating event in a long series of incidents. Looking back I can see that many of my beliefs about what people thought of me in high school spring from this encounter. That sad thing is, so much of what I assumed to be true wasn’t, but after experiences  like this, I wasn’t willing to take the risks necessary to learn that. I believed I was hated and shunned by most of my classmates, so that became my reality, even though many kids had no more malice for me than I had for them, and some of the bullies were only trying to avoid being singled out themselves. When you’re 14 you don’t have the perspective to see outside of your own experience.

I wrestled over changing the names and ultimately decided to do it. Not because these people could sue me, or because they deserve the anonymity, but because it felt wrong, almost like a form of revenge, to include them.

8^th Grade Hell

I sit at the back of my 8^th grade Language Arts class hearing laughter up front where a big knot of kids pulls in tight to discuss A Separate Peace. I don’t join them. I’m not welcome, so I huddle out of the way in my Goodwill clothes and my glasses that have the earpieces held on with black electrical tape.

Lexi Smith is up there. My best friend and worst enemy. On our “friend” days we sneak money out of her dad’s 5-gallon bottle of coins, which is so heavy it takes both of us to tip it. We ride to Dave’s Country Market on her motorcycle, keeping mostly to the fields, except for one quarter-mile stretch where we brave the Scenic Highway. Though we stick to the edge of the road, outside the white line, somehow that never fools cops into thinking we’re obeying the law.

On “enemy” days Lexi calls me Space Freak because ever since I saw Star Wars I’ve been crazy about science fiction and astronomy.

Up by the white board the laughter gets rowdier. There’s something malignant in it, and I strain to hear, eyes locked on the book I’m supposed to be reading. I know from experience that this kind of snickering means its time to hide or run. Lexi’s voice weaves in and out of the laughter. I catch a snippet of words that sound familiar, and then a whole sentence. Shame and outrage flare up, bigger than a supernova. My journal!

I leap up, charge to the front of the room, snatch the pages from Lexi’s hands. Her face is one big, nasty grin. Laughter swells around me, raucous now, because I’m making a scene. Kids like this feed off the energy of an emotional reaction the way a star feeds off hydrogen and helium. I attack Lexi, wanting to slap that mocking look off her face, and then the teacher is there, pulling us apart. Where has he been all this time? He’s supposed to be my friend! How could he let them do this?

*          *          *

We’re in the conference room in the library seated around a long table. Me, my teacher, the principal, and the whole Language Arts class.  I feel hopeful, because someone’s finally doing something, and humiliated, because everyone’s staring at me.  Deep down I know that this is only going to make things worse.

“She asks for it!” Tony Davis says, and it a way it’s true. I call him Tony “Davidson”, because he’s wigged out about Harleys.  But the difference between my insults and theirs is that I never start it. I only fight back, and I tell the principal so.

Tony knows he messed up. He goes for a distraction. “Back in first grade my mom told me I had to be nice to her because she’s adopted.”

My skin flashes cold and my gut crumples on itself like a wad of paper. No one’s made a secret of my adoption, but I didn’t know people were talking about it, making me into some pathetic Orphan Annie.

“But I’m tired of it,” Tony rages. “She’s a freak!”

That’s true, too. I make up little astronomy quizzes for our Language Arts teacher, who’s a grown-up, closet space freak, or maybe just pretends to be because he feels sorry for me. Every night I pray that God will let me see a UFO, because I want aliens to abduct me, and I’d go willingly, no matter how weird they looked.

The principal talks, the teacher talks, the kids mostly sit there wishing they were someplace else, except a few like Tony, who keep blaming it on me.

In the end, nothing is resolved. The bell rings. We get up to go. I walk out of the room, head down, wishing I was dead, and knowing that nothing will ever change.

Love: It’s Better Than a Sharp Stick in the Eye

Before I delve into my Valentine’s Day post, I’d like to take a moment to honor my state’s sesquicentennial. Happy 150^th birthday, Oregon! You don’t look a day over 4.5 billion.

And now, our featured attraction!

Just about three years ago my boyfriend and I began planning our nuptials. We wanted a party that everyone would remember as the best wedding they’d ever been to. No formal attire, no gifts, just a big, happy bash. We decided to have an outdoor wedding at my brother’s property in Estacada. In lieu of gifts several people were asked to bring a cake of their choice. Humor, naturally, would have to play a large role in the affair.

First, we sent out invitations that were made to look like the form a person would fill out when ordering their invitations from the printer. Bob filled all these in by hand.

Then we wrote our own vows:

Do you, Bob, take Lisa to be your lawfully wedded wife

in obsessive obstinacy and in rare moments of blissful peace,

to adopt each of her current and future cats as your own,

and to listen to endless revisions of her damned book,

until you roll off to that great wrecking yard in the sky?

Do you, Lisa, take Bob to be your lawfully wedded husband

in moments of whimsy or when more laid-back than a cat in a coma,

no matter how many times he tells you to take your feet off the dashboard,

fails to replace the toilet paper, or bumps his movies to the top of the NetFlix queue?

The ceremony was a big hit, though a few of our older, more traditional friends did find it a little perplexing.

After we exchanged vows, the band began playing. The bass player was a good friend of ours and also our Snap-on dealer. I’d been practicing a song with them for weeks, The Ballad of Thunder Road by Robert Mitchum, and was nervous about singing it. But to add to my jitters, I’d decided to give a speech to explain something that had happened to me a few days before the wedding. Something that was so pathetic it was funny: A black eye.

First, I’d like to thank all of you for coming way out here today to help Bob and I celebrate this truly earthshaking occasion.  And, of course for bringing the food.

I guess some of you are wondering about the black eye.  Well, you can stop giving my husband that look.  He had nothing to do with it.

What it was, actually, was the proverbial sharp stick in the eye.  Literally.  Monday I came half an inch from having a very, very bad day.  Any day you don’t lose an eye is a glorious day indeed.  And I’m gonna try to remember that the next time I blow up the engine in my car.

It could have been worse. I could have been the pirate bride, today, with an eye patch.

“Lisa, do you take Bob to be your lawfully wedded husband?”

“Arrrrr!”

What happened was that I was doing some yard work.  I bent over to water a plant and poked myself with a bamboo stake.  And people used to tell me that racing was dangerous.  Stock car racing has nothing on landscaping.  Heck, I rolled a car and didn’t come out of it looking this bad.

It’s no big deal, really, other than it happened five days before my wedding.  Wedding.  Now there’s a scary thought.  Who would’ve guessed that either Bob or I would ever get married?

A friend of mine sent me this card.  “Heard you were getting married.  Missed the report on hell freezing over.”  You laugh, but my family knows it’s true.  They didn’t think they’d ever see this day.

But here I am. And you know what my first impression of marriage is?  It’s better than a sharp stick in the eye.

Well, I know you people want to go sample all that food, but before I let you get to it I have just one more story to tell…

Hit it, boys!

(segue into The Ballad of Thunder Road)

After people hit the refreshments table (catered by Costco), our minister lead the crowd in the hokey pokey, and then it was time to cut the cakes. There were many of them—red velvet, German chocolate, lemon—and our official, very non-traditional, American Chocolate Cake from Costco. For our bride and groom figures we used tiny replicas of Lightning McQueen and Sally Porsche from the movie Cars.

"And they lived happily ever after"

Rather than feeding each other cake, Bob and I plucked our automotive representatives from the top and licked the frosting off each other’s undercarriages.

Starting our own tradition

It was a perfect day, a perfect wedding, and even the little kids had fun.

The Realities of Being Adopted

When you’re adopted, you lose certain rights. The right to a real birth certificate. The right to blood relatives. The right to the truth about your entry into the world. The right to your medical history. The system is designed to protect the privacy of the birth parents and the feelings of the adoptive parents, even at the expense of the health of the child.

I realize that adoption laws are in the process of changing, but the fact remains that adult adoptees have to go through extra steps and pay additional expenses to achieve the same rights as those who aren’t adopted. Applying for a passport is just one example. The “proof of citizenship” requirement is a birth certificate filed within one year of birth. But at the time of adoption, these records are sealed and a new certificate is issued in the adoptive parents’ names.  This means that people adopted later in life need to supplement their birth certificate with items such as records from a family Bible or a signed statement from someone witnessing the birth. These things may be impossible to obtain in cases where the adoptive family is no longer in contact with the birth parents and the state is protecting the their privacy. Maybe provisions are made for adoptees, but if so, they aren’t listed on the passport application. Regardless, extra steps have to be taken. Steps that others don’t have to mess with.

It’s not like I have some misguided notion that the world ought to be fair. All I have to do is look at recent local changes in drivers’ licensing to see that it isn’t. Numerous women in Oregon have been forced to pay hundreds, even thousands, of dollars and invest countless hours in creating a paper trail to prove they are who they say they are. Men, who don’t change their names at marriage, have been spared all this. No, life isn’t fair, and I don’t expect it to be. But I still find it annoying, partly because it touches off emotions that are better left buried.

I first saw my adoption certificate at the age of 10 when I needed to show proof of who I was to the school in order play soccer. (God knows there were armies of 5^th grade terrorists back in the 70s just looking to wreak havoc on the country.) I questioned my mother about the fact that my birth parents weren’t listed on the document. She told me they weren’t listed on my birth certificate, either—that when a child is adopted, the adoptive parents are added in the place of the birth parents.

The idea stunned me. How could the government change history like that? Didn’t they know that real was real? My mother couldn’t see my point about the facts being altered. “Of course I’m your real mom!” she said, letting me know that her feelings were what mattered, and I had no right to my outrage against the state of Oregon or my utter shock at the idea that the government could tell lies and get away with it. As adults we all know the government adjusts the facts as it sees fit, but when you’re 10 that concept rocks your faith in reality.

Though my adoption occurred when I was five and was technically considered “open”, I rarely got to see my birth mom until I became an adult.  This was because my adoptive mother looked at my ongoing need for my birth mom as evidence that I didn’t love her enough.  The name “mom” was reserved only for my adoptive mother, and I was told that I should call my birth mom “Aunt Dani”. I learned to stop asking about her because it hurt my new mom’s feelings. And in my house, hurting Mom ’s feelings was the worst sin you could commit.

Not having a real birth certificate, not having access to my blood relatives or even the truth, made me feel like a second-class citizen, cut off from “normal” kids who had baby books and a family history that included their presence. Even as a kid I took pride in being my own unique self, but on some issues you don’t want to be different. You want to feel a connection, a sense of community with the rest of the world.

All this comes up when I run into situations where I need a birth certificate.  It’s not a huge deal, but it reminds me that once again I have to take time away from my real work to fight for things that I shouldn’t have to fight for.  It rams home that fallacy that somehow I’m not the same as everyone else, and that I don’t have the rights that they do.