optimisticdad-blog

[optimisticdad-blog]

Reach Heaven (Through Violence)

When I was in 2nd grade, my school started a zero-tolerance policy for bullying. I want to emphasize that I started out very excited for this program. I was a small, visibly autistic child on a playground with fourth graders on it. In theory, this program might as well have been called The Rescue Babs Initiative. 

In practice, however, zero-tolerance programs almost always sink into madness. The motivations never line up right - too many incentives for cheating.

The first victim of the program was actually my friend, Sam. I was standing next to him in line when one of the fourth graders gut punched him. There was no reason for the punch, he was just small and in arm's reach. Sam got the wind knocked out of him, but he managed to gasp out the phrase stupid motherfucker right as the playground aide ran over to keep the peace. 

(Sam had an incredible vocabulary for a 2nd grader. Consequence of his dad being a recently divorced mechanic.)

Puncher got a two week suspension. That was fine. But Sam got a one week one for verbal abuse, which was beyond the pale. But that’s just what zero-tolerance is, right? No hitting became a rule everyone had to follow, and it didn't stop when someone hit us. So our options as kids were to somehow make like Jesus and ascend up to heaven… or solve things ourselves. 

We started solving things ourselves. 

I'll be honest, I think that was always the plan. A school can do a lot of things to reduce bullying, but if the goal is zero, there's only one path forward: Shoot the messenger. 

---

My part in the story was a few weeks after that. Long enough to know that the school's new unofficial policy was to suspend kids that reported problems, short enough to have no idea how to defend myself. It turned out the 4th grader that hit Sam was part of a trio, and that trio had their sights on me next. 

I asked some of my classmates what to do, and they said that the best idea was to just ignore the bullies. Refuse to give them a reaction. That was dogshit advice, but it was common enough in the early 2000s and it's not like I can fault 2nd graders for not knowing much about life. 

Anyway. I took the advice and I ignored my bullies. I ignored them when they said nasty things about my mom, and I ignored them when they bounced soccer balls off my head, and the one time I broke was when the biggest of the trio grabbed my arm hard enough to leave finger shaped bruises. We were watching a movie in the gym when he did that, and I leaned over and told him he could hold my hand if he was scared of the dark. Which worked, thank God. The grip hurt bad enough I had to excuse myself for a bit to keep my composure. 

I think a more mentally flexible kid would've changed strategies by then. Clearly, things were escalating. But it's hard for me to change my mind, so I stuck to my bad strategy, right up until the day the big kids caught me after school. I was crossing the baseball field when they got me. It was just one of those places you had to walk through to make it to the bike rack. 

The big guy, again, was the instigator. He pushed me down then stood over me, yelling for me to get back up. But I knew that if I got back up, he'd just push me down again, and for whatever reason, their Bully Code didn't allow for kicking a kid that was already down. So I stuck to the grass, and they tried a bunch of things to goad me into standing back up. Eventually, I started kicking at them while on my back, and one of them took the opportunity to grab my leg. Second bully thought that looked fun, so he grabbed my other leg. Kicking me like that was off limits, but dragging wasn't, so they just started pulling me around that way. 

They were so much taller than me that I was almost vertical during the pull so all my weight was put on my shoulders. And the fields were just made of unkind stuff. There was crushed gravel all over the place, spilled out from the divider between the big kid playground and the little kid playground, so every time they dragged me over a piece it just ripped a new gouge up my back. The ground itself was sunbaked caliche and dead crabgrass. There was a grit to it, like sand stuck to the outside of a clay pot. 

It grated all the skin off my upper back. Everything between the bottom of my neck to the bottom of my shoulder blades. I don't know at what points I went from yelling, to screaming, to just crying, but I did, and I know they seemed almost giddy every time it changed. Eventually they finished off with one loop around the baseball diamond and that hurt the worst. The dust there stuck to the snot and spit all over my face and made it into a foul mud, and the same happened in my shirt. The dust stung like salt, and the gravel in the lines tore open a few more cuts for dirt to pour in. I remember them stopping, and actually crying again I was so relieved. It was done. Thank God, it was finally done. They were done hurting me. 

They left me on my back near homebase (a base). They'd finally got the reaction they were looking for.

It took me a few minutes after that to stagger back to my feet. I was able to wash the snot-mud off my face in the bathroom, but I couldn't bring myself to touch my back. It just felt like it was on fire. Then I made it back to the bike rack. 

That’s where my older sister, Liz, waiting for me. She was just a grade ahead of me but it always felt bigger than that. There’s some deep weight associated with being the oldest. She could see that I was dirty and tear soaked so she asked what happened. I didn’t know how to put it in words, so I just tried lifting my shirt to show her. It made a sticky, tacky sound coming up - like the plastic coat coming off a slice of American cheese. Tchhhhk. 

I didn’t know how bad they’d got me before I heard that noise.

She looked at my back for maybe two seconds before telling me to put my shirt back down. I never actually looked at it when it was fresh, but I still had straggling scars by the time I got to highschool. Long silver-grey lines, visible mostly for the dirt still stuck in them. She looked a little sick when I turned around, but she kept it cool, which I really appreciated. I always hated crying in public, and I was half a hair from crying all over again. I don't think I'd have been able to keep it together if she'd freaked out too. 

Instead, she just asked me some questions. Who did this, how long they’d been doing it, what I’d been doing, if I’d told anyone. Some 4th graders, a month, trying to ignore them, nobody. 

She mulled those answers over. I could see her trying to chart a course forward - trying to figure out what it would take to solve this problem for good. She's always had this weird, sad, blank face that she'd make when she found a solution she didn't like. She'd make that face, then think some more, then make the face. Then think. 

Eventually, she just made the face. 

Don't tell the parents, she said. I can fix this. But only if you don’t tell them. 

I believed her. She was the most capable person I knew, and her word was gold. So I didn't tell our parents. I biked home, and every drop of sweat that rolled down my back felt like acid on my skin. I remember getting home and beelining straight to the bath, because I needed something to put the fire out. Took that as my moment to cry it out again too. First time I'd cried was from pain, but the second time was from the cruelty. Second time took longer, but the nice thing about a cold bath is that the water never runs out. I could just pop the plug out with my toes and just keep rinsing and draining and rinsing and draining until my mind was as clean and empty and stark as the tub itself. Then I could go fill that emptiness up with Calvin and Hobbes. 

It worked.

Mostly. 

---

I spent the whole next week feeling nervous anytime I was outside and Liz wasn't nearby. Some days she'd beat me to the bike racks, and I'd be relieved as hell to just go home. Other days, I'd be the first one out, and then I'd have to spend a few minutes worrying about what I'd do if the big kids showed up. But they never did. Liz always got there just a few minutes later, and I'd pretend I hadn't been planning escape routes.

Friday, I was sweating by myself when she showed up a few minutes later than normal. She unlocked her bike but she didn't move to leave. She had this big, long cable-type lock, maybe  six feet of braided steel. She folded it over in her hands so it looked like a swatter and swung it a few times in the air. Made it whistle like a falling anvil in a cartoon.

Today's baseball practice, she said. All Our Guys are on the baseball team. 

Our Guys. Odd phrasing. Also, I actually hadn't known that about them, but I nodded along anyway. She wasn't really looking at me as she talked - she was inspecting the lock.

My plan, she continued, is to wait here until baseball's done. Me and you. When it gets time I'll send you outside the bike cage.

The cage was a chain link fence, maybe six feet tall, built all around the rack. They’d lock it after school as an extra precaution against bike thieves. 

Your job, she continued, will be to hold the gate closed after they're all in. Keep em’ stuck. Think you can do that? 

She was being very frank, which helped me think clearly. I didn't think I could actually hold the gate closed if all of them ran into it at once, but I knew where a big half broken cinder block was, and I knew if I could wedge it in there, it would hold. So I told her that. 

Great, she said. Do that. 

Then I went to go get the block. She gave the cable a few more experimental swings, right as I made it around the corner. 

I'd been thinking in straight lines before that. Just meeting goals. It wasn't until that moment that I really allowed myself to know what was happening. That I allowed myself to have a choice. 

I chose to jog a little faster. I wanted revenge. 

---

I came back with the block a few minutes later, then we just talked like nothing was happening. The sun was shining, and we’d both gotten into bionicles, and it was easy to talk and be people. Normal, happy people. 

But that feeling went away when I heard the coach tweet a long whistle. Me and Liz both knew that was the signal that practice was done. I walked out and got my bric while she folded the cable in half in her hand again. Then we both waited. 

Eventually I saw the kids that drug me around the baseball diamond emerge from behind the portables. I watched them make a straight line back to the bike rack. They were laughing together, having a good time. Being normal. Like me and my sister. I realized I could let things be normal too. I saw my chance to let things go softball pitched to me, nice and easy, and I didn't even bother to swing. I didn't want normal anymore. I wanted this. I knew why my sister had that lock, and I'd thought about it, and I liked it.  

God help me, I think I needed it. 

The kids went inside the bike cage. I gave them ten paces head start, then put the cinder block under the gate. That was the signal Liz had been waiting for. 

She blitzed those boys. There were three of them, and the smallest still had two inches on her, so they probably would have kicked her ass if they ever had a moment to think. But she never gave them that moment. She picked the biggest kid, and decided he needed the first blow. I remember how much muscle she put into that swing - the cable was so heavy, and she was so small, that it kind of swung her back as she made that first half spin. Like a dog getting wagged by its own tail. 

It was a perfect connection. Flawless. She swung through her target, not at it, and the resulting slap that the cable made bouncing off the biggest kid's stomach was loud enough to echo through the cage. It brought a tear to my eye. It brought a tear to his eye too. 

The trio split after that, bouncing around the cage like fresh broke billiards. I can't describe how Liz did it, exactly, but she managed to chase the boys back together so she could hit them all more efficiently. She had a real knack for getting them right between the shoulders, so I never got to see the real perfection of her work, but she wasn't above swinging for the arms or legs if that was all she had. Those marks I could see, and they were brutal. The welts were wider and thicker than my thumb, like giant purple worms were trying to burrow out of their skin. Some even bled. I cheered on every hit. 

Liz, for her part, just had a sort of grim, single minded determination to her. She was so angry she was shaking, and so scared that tears just kept running down her face, and she was grinning all the way back to her molars, but the grin didn't get any bigger after a solid hit than a glancing one. When the kids started blubbering, she didn't change her process. I'd spent my time crying, she'd spent her time crying, of course they were getting theirs in too: That's what violence does. It brings tears. Sow the wind, reap the whirlwind. 

Eventually, one of the kids split off from the main herd and scrambled up the fence, gecko-style. Liz let him go. It was either that, or take her attention off the other two. Easy choice. 

Now, there were two kids left, the big one, and one of his smaller friends. Smaller friend did the same trick. I was worried he was gonna turn back, fight me and open the gate for his buddy, but he just fled for the hills. I remember thinking, damn, I hope they never forgive each other for this. I hope this ruins their whole friendship. I hope this festers into something awful. 

The one kid that was left really was trapped though. He wasn't built for climbing and he had no one to work as a distraction for him. Every time he started trying to make it up the fence, my sister would just twist up like a spring, then swing the cable with both hands right into his spine. The slap it made every time she did that was loud enough to hurt my ears. He never made it more than two hits like that before hopping off the fence and just trying to run around some more. He could get Liz tangled up in the bikes for a bit if he really tried, but it never bought him enough time to actually get out. She'd always find her way out of the thicket, swing the cable, and send him running again. 

Eventually, he just couldn't run anymore. He sat down, and my sister hit him a few times, telling him to stand up. He refused. He knew he was gonna get hit either way, so he might as well get hit sitting down. He put his arms up after a bit and let those take a beating too. Eventually he just started begging her to stop. So she did. 

He cried he was so relieved. I remembered how that felt: It’s done. Thank God, it’s finally done. They’re done hurting me. 

Liz told me to come in and show him my back. I took my shirt off, and I showed him a scab as large as a dinner plate. Cracked up like dry river mud. 

He looked sick. Started babbling about how he didn't know. Said he thought I was crying because I was just a kid - that he didn't know he was actually hurting me. That he'd just wanted to get a rise out of me and didn't know it would take so much. 

He didn't know he'd gone too far until it was too late. 

And suddenly, it was like looking in a mirror. 

Two snotty, welted boys, crying alone in the dirt. Backs burning like fire. Ashamed. Trapped. Realizing that they'd just done something awful, and worse, that they’d dragged the people that meant the most to them along for the ride. 

I hated him more at that moment than when he drug me over gravel. I can’t imagine anyone wanting to kill anything but their own brokenness reflected. Looking at him was unbearable. Like staring straight into the sun. 

I could've hit him again if I hadn't just gorged myself on violence. But I had. I was fat with it, sick and aching - anything more and I would have puked. So I just told him to get his bike and go. Please. Just go. 

He did. He staggered to his feet, and he grabbed his bike before running away like all the demons in hell were following behind. All bar two. There was a swingset nearby, and once he was fully out of sight, Liz and I walked over to it. We picked two seats next to each other and sat for a while, talking until our hands stopped shaking. Can’t remember about what. We didn’t really know how to process what had just happened. Still don’t, to be honest. 

Then we went home.

---

Thanks to @elisabethdeep-blog, @foldingfittedsheets, @amateurmasksmith, @caramel-catss @arataya, and @rozenkingdom for being my alpha readers.

And thanks @lizardho, for being my first friend, my best friend, and my childhood bodyguard. I know it took a toll on you. I'm truly sorry.

[optimisticdad-blog]

One of the weird things about growing up me is just the increased lack of social awareness sort of slowly reaching a crescendo in junior high. I remember getting picked on a lot more as I got older and older in elementary school, and the bullying started hitting in a weird way in Jr. High. Like, my knowledge of age-appropriate things had finally capped out and I was just entirely oblivious to the fact I was being picked on. Sometimes people made it easy, like the kid who told me my mom made me wrong, but sometimes it was harder. I do have some interesting memories from that time, though, and a lot of them are centered around a very small group of people who were willing to explain things to me. I remember in 7th grade I met a girl in a math class who was incomprehensibly kind to me. She wanted to be a special ed teacher, her older and younger brothers were both on the autism spectrum, and she was friends with all the emo and goth kids, so she was like the perfect storm of patient kindness and anti-establishment knowledge I needed. I remember one day walking out of math class after a fairly hard quiz, and she said,

“Oh man, that quiz was hard. I could really use a hug.”

An I responded with, “Oh, yeah, a hug would be awesome.” And then we just kinda sat there until I saw the light flick on in her brain, like “Oooh, that’s what her deal is!” and she said “Hey, can I have a hug from you?” and I said, “Yeah!” And gave her a hug, and like, even if I didn’t know what my deal was, she sure as hell did.

In addition to being absurdly kind, she was also EXTREMELY conventionally attractive, good at makeup, funny, and had an insatiable bloodlust for bullies, so she drew a lot of a certain type of people in. I always kinda felt lucky just being her friend because God only knows how I would have lived otherwise. One day we were walking to an assembly and she did a little jog to catch up to me because my confused gay ass always walked SUPER fast, and she got me to slow down so we could talk and that was VERY kind. And because of that, one of the kids in our class who had a HUGE crush on her and didn’t know the next thing about her thought that if he made me look mad enough or dumb enough or something that she’d stop talking to me and start talking to him. So he starts by coming up to me and saying,

“Hey dude, I fucking fingered your sister last night.”

And I am a bonafide grade-a dumbass who Does Not Know What Sex Is so I thought he meant he fingered her for a crime. But my sister was like 5 so I was like “What crime could a 5 year old commit?” so I was like “What do you mean? Like, shoplifting?”

And to his credit, he kinda stopped for a second. Not because he wanted to, but because with all his experience as a bully he had yet to encounter someone quite as earnestly confused as me. After he recovered from what, to him, was a bizarre crazy-person non-sequitur, he said,

“No, dude, I mean I fingered your sister last night.”

And I said, “Dude, she’s like…5, what could you have fingered her for?” And he was doubling down so he goes “Because I fucking wanted to,” with a big cocky smile on his face, which was NOT an answer to my question because I NEEDED to know what crime this dick thought a 5 year old could commit between 6:00 dinner and 8:30 bed time. So I kept asking, “But like, what was the crime? Like what did you finger her for?” and he kept being like “Because I want to” or “Because your sister’s nasty like that,” both of which were wholly insufficient answers. He thought I was ignoring him or stupid, and I thought he was a total moron, and realistically both of us were right.

And the whole time we’re talking about this, she is glaring daggers at him and telling him to Shut The Entire Fuck Up because she knows what he’s saying and she knows I do not and she doesn’t want me to learn like this. And finally, because he thinks she’s doing that thing that girls don’t actually do but that boys THINK they do of feigning being mad to play along and egg me on, he starts looking at her like they’re in cahoots, and she says “Oh my God you sick jerk just leave us ALONE!” and that gets a teacher’s attention. And suddenly he’s red-faced and confused because he thought he was looking like Chad Thundercock the top king stud of all time and realistically he’s looking more like the comedy relief pseudo-bully from an 80s film. And because she yelled at him to leave us alone, a teacher almost immediately comes over to check on what’s going on, and she explains it all in graphic detail and that kid got detention and probably a tension headache from trying to make his brain think good enough to figure out how all this happened. And once it was done she just grabbed my arm by the elbow and said “I’m so sorry about that, come on, let’s just go,” and I said, “Idk why you’re sorry, I don’t even know what’s going on.” And she said, “I know, sweetie, I know. Do me a favor and don’t look it up.” And because I promised her I didn’t end up knowing what fingering was until I was a Sophomore in high school when someone in theater explained it to me and I was retroactively so mad at this kid I almost went blind.

I actually have a LOT of stories about this kind of stuff so if y’all like this I will post more.

[optimisticdad-blog]

When I was in my Emergency Medicine residency many years ago I worked with some of the finest people alive. We do all posses a warped and twisted sense of humor.

This is a fun memory.

As a senior resident my typical ER shift was 4pm to 2 am. This sounds bad, but was nice. My kids were not in school so I could spend time with them in the day, and then work the ER during peak hours.

After my shift I would return home and we took turns carrying the “mommy pager”. The mommy pager was a number that nervous moms could call for medical advice. Usually I just helped them figure out the dose of Tylenol for their baby, or get an appointment with the pediatrician the next day.

One night I got home and quietly climbed into bed next to my sleeping wife. I sat the mommy pager on the nightstand. I had just drifted off to sleep when the pager buzzed. Half awake I called the number. A man answered. He told me that his toddler had been crawling around the floor and had eaten a a piece of fishing line. He was worried and our conversation went like this:

dad: my baby ate some fishing line and I’m worried.

Me: no worries. It should cause no harm and come out in his diaper.

Dad: that is the issue. He has about 8 inches of fishing line hanging out his butt, but he screams if i pull on it.

Me: please don’t pull on it. Was anything connected to the line? Could it have had a fish hook. (Back ground noise is crying baby).

Him: it was just line, but I can’t get it to come out I have been trying to pull on it but baby screams.

Me: (now fully awake). Do NOT pull on the fishing line.

Dad: I figured it might need some lube so I squirted some dish soap up his butt.

Me: please,don’t do that.

Dad: it didn’t help so I tried some honey to see if maybe it would all stick together and come out.

me: sir, I will call the pediatric ER. You should take your baby in and they will see what the problem is.

Dad: I think I can just yank it out. It is hard to grip so I have wound the end around a pencil. I have baby face down on the kitchen table and I am going to yank it. Just like im starting a chain saw.

Me: (panic rising). STOP! Do not do that. Can you take the baby to the ER where my college will help? (In the background the baby screams loudly)

Me: Sir, is your wife at home. Please put her on the phone.

Dad: the doctor wants to talk to you.

Me to Mom. I’m not sure what is going on and think we should get your baby checked. I will call the pediatric ER and they will help us fix this. Can you please take your baby to the ER?

mom: no. My husband is sure he can yank it out (baby screams in background)

Me: do NOT let him. Go to the ER now.

Mom: breaks down in uncontrollable laughter. She confesses she is not the mom. She is the ER nurse and she and my fellow,resident have been prank calling me at 3 am.

I have fallen for this prank call hook, line, and sinker. I am now 100% awake and my wife has woken up and is offering advice as well.

This is the hazard of working with smart people who are bored at 3 am on a slow night. Some day I will share some other bizarre prank calls from the ER.

(No babies were hurt. The crying babies in the background were all there for other medica issues.)

[optimisticdad-blog]

Hey friends,

I have not blogged before but my children are expert bloggers. Many of you have read the thoughts and stories of inbabylontheywept, lizardho, and flowerologist. I am going to practice and share a few stories.

For now I will say hello. I am a retired ER doctor. After the ER I owned and managed some Urgent Care centers. I have amazing children and my wife is awesome.

Jjst for practice here is a story from my ER days.

I once worked at a trauma center near an Indian reservation. I loved my Indian patients, and they tolerated me.

One night the am ambulance called to tell me they were on their way in with a TWICE ejected passenger from a roll over crash.

Ejected passengers are often in a bad way. When a car flips it can sling unbelted passengers right out the window. When this happens they skid down the road and sometimes they end up under the car then on top of the car then back under the car.

I did not understand how this man had been ejected from the car twice. I was curios.

It seems my friend had gone to the bar drinking with friends. There were more friends than there were seats so after they bar closed they drew straws to see who got to ride up front in the heated cab of the truck and who had to ride in the bed. George drew the short straw so he climbed into the back. On the road home he got cold and he realized he had to pee really bad. Everyone in the truck was extremely drunk. George pounded on the back window but everyone inside was singing with the radio and nobody could hear him.

He decided he could get their attention by climbing onto the roof of the truck and sliding down the windshield. When he did this it startled the driver who slammed on the breaks and sent George shooting down the road in a series of somersaults and cartwheels. He ended up in the ditch next to the road. The guys in the truck slammed on the gas and went home.

In the morning one guy woke up and recalled a vivid dream in which George had been launched from the truck down the road. He called one of the other hung over friends to tell him about the terrifying dream.

His friend said he had experienced the exact same dream. That spoke for a minute about how weird that was before deciding that perhaps it had not been a nightmare, but had actually happened.

They hopped in their Ford pickup and drove up the road and sure enough there was George in the ditch covered in boo boos and frost because it froze that night. They panicked and put him into the truck and raced towards the hospital while calling 911. They were all still pretty drunk and in their haste they drove off the road and into the ditch and flipped the truck and George was once again launched down the road.

The ambulance that responded to their 911 call found George and brought him to me. He did fine because he had a blood alcohol level that confers on a man temporary immortality.

That is the story of my twice ejected passenger from a roll over MVA.