SCHOOL REUNION

SCHOOL REUNION

                At school I was bullied and was one of the most unpopular students at school – during both primary and high school. I didn’t feel I was attending school to gain an education, I felt like I was going to school to get emotionally abused. It wasn’t one person who was bullying me, it wasn’t a group of students who were bullying me; there were a lot of people who bullied me at school and it would have been impossible for me to be able to tell you who they were and their names (even at the time I wouldn’t have known all their names). It just seemed like I was the kid that people bullied and even students who I didn’t even know bullied me. Those kids had no justified reason to bully me – I had never done anything wrong to them or anyone else. They bullied me and they got away with it and there was nothing I could do about it. It just seemed like when one person did it and got away with it everyone else thought they could do it as well and get away with it – and that’s exactly what happened. I was told I was ugly and they would make fun of me for numerous reasons, most of the reasons were superficial. I was skinny but I was also awkward, shy, introverted, poor at sport, and I failed most subjects due to the fact I couldn’t concentrate in class. The only subjects I was any good at was art and history, and even though I spent my entire life enjoying books and reading, I didn’t do well in English because I didn’t like most of the books they gave us to read. There were particular books I did like but most I couldn’t get into. It’s a shame they wouldn’t let us pick our own books to read then my enthusiasm for English would have improved. I was a bit of a nerd, I wasn’t cool or popular and at recess and lunch I would spend time at the library or in the out of bounds areas. I would hang out in those areas because I knew I would be safe there and away from any bullies. However I would get detention often for getting caught in the out of bounds area by the teachers. If I approached a teacher about being bullied at school they would send me to the counsellor. I would just sit there and think ‘Why am I being counselled? You should be counselling the bullies they’re the ones with the problem’. The counsellors would ask dumb questions like “Why don’t they like you?” and I would be like “How would I know?” (I didn’t actually say that). Is there any justified reason to bully someone? No. I just knew I was the kid that got picked on. The teachers and my mother expected me to go to school every day just to be constantly fucked with. When I told my mother about being picked on she would always say “just ignore them” which didn’t help me at all. The teachers didn’t do anything about the bullies and in all honesty what could they do? Even as an adult I wouldn’t even know what advice I would give to a teacher or a school on how to handle bullies because there was too many of them. My friends at school were bullied as well – Sharon, Katie, Matthew etc. I’m not sure if they were bullied more than me or not. My brother tried to make me feel better during the summer before I started high school for the first time, he tried to reassure me that things will be better for me in high school, he said the high school kids were more mature than primary kids and they don’t bully as much and it won’t be as bad for me. My brother was one of the nerds in high school – but people liked and respected him and even though he got bullied sometimes he was left alone most of the time. He blended in well at school. High school was worse for me than primary school and that’s when more of the bullying towards me occurred.

                I left school and as time went by, I got over it. But it’s not something you can get over completely. As time goes by the memories fade but they don’t fade completely. You can’t unlearn something just like you can’t unremember something. When you leave school you learn that not everyone is an asshole – but you do learn that even adults can be bullies. It upsets me when we always hear about bullying and they always refer to school students as being bullies and victims of bullying. There are just as many adults who are bullies. I’ve experienced a lot of bullying in my adult life as well. A lot of parents teach their kids to be bullies, they don’t verbally tell them “be a bully” but kids grow up and notice how their parents behave and they mimic them and think its normal. A lot of parents don’t even care that their kids are bullies they stand by their kid even if their kid are in the wrong.

          I only remained in touch with a hand full of people from school. Years later I got a friend request from this guy from school called Simon who was adding everyone from our school, primary and high school and said he was organising a primary school reunion. At first it was supposed to be just a primary school reunion but he later invited kids from our high school as well. A lot of the kids from primary school went to the same high school. He was adding us all into this Facebook group and kept us up to date on the arrangements. We had to all pay money to go, but that went on drinks and to hire the hall, so that was cool. He told us that our primary school had given us permission for anyone interested to have a tour of our old school for nostalgic reasons. That was something I was looking forward to. Those who I went to school with had kids of their own who attended the same schools we went to, so they probably weren’t interested in the school tour. However, Simon cancelled the tour of the school which was disappointing. I would have loved to have a tour of our primary and high school just for nostalgic reasons.

                Even though I was bullied at school I just put that all behind me and I was excited about going. I got in contact with some of the people I went to school with like Sharon and Katie. Sharon was hesitant about going and Katie wasn’t interested at all, Katie doesn’t like going out. Sharon and her boyfriend Keith decided to go which was good because I didn’t want to be there by myself.

I had a friend on Facebook that I went to primary and high school with called Daisy who told me she was attending our school reunion. Daisy was a friend of Katie’s when she was at school but they had a falling out later on. Katie alleged that Daisy stole from her aunty and didn’t believe she was trustworthy. Katie’s aunt also said she believed it was Daisy who stole her ring (engagement ring or something?). I was still associated with Daisy but we were just acquaintances and we weren’t close buddies. When Katie was in high school, Daisy influenced Katie to smoke cigarettes and when Katie’s mother found out the shit hit the fan. It was a bit like that episode of The Brady Bunch when Greg Brady got caught holding a cigarette. Daisy also influenced Katie to wag school a few times and when Katie’s mother found out shit hit the fan again. Shit was hitting the fan all the time when Katie was associating with Daisy. I listened to what Katie and her aunty told me about Daisy and I took it into consideration. I don’t like people who steal or who are untrustworthy and I don’t like associating with people who are like that. Daisy was still young when she was hanging out with Katie, so I gave her the benefit of the doubt and I assumed she would be more mature now. Daisy asked me if I was going and I said yes, and she said she was going alone and since I was going alone we should meet up and hang out with each other. She told me, she was like me and didn’t want to turn up alone either. I was talking to my friend Sebastian about going to my school reunion and he didn’t have fond memories of the school he went to and said “I didn’t want to hang around those people at school; so I don’t want to hang around them today”.

                I didn’t know what to expect from a school reunion. I liked that movie Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion where the unpopular girls got even with the mean girls. Whenever you watch a high school movie, it always portrays girls as being the bitches and never the boys. I think that’s a dishonest stereotype to paint. When I was at school I was bullied by just as many boys as I did from girls. Boys are just as nasty as girls are and they tend to get away with it more. Boys are also victims of bullying. It’s hard when you are a teenager and you are getting into boys and you want them to like you. When you are a teenager all you think about is boys and romance (and sex) and you want them to like you so it makes it even more difficult when boys are bullying you about your appearance etc. The older you get the less you give a fuck about what people think of you and you don’t care as much as being accepted by them. The older you get the more confident you become.

                I planned to meet up with Sharon, Keith and Daisy at the same time. On the afternoon when I was getting ready, I started to get extremely nervous and I got anxiety. The memories about all those times I got bullied at school just flooded back to me when I was standing in front of the mirror. I was okay about the reunion before this. I also would get anxiety every time I went out to hang out with Sharon and Keith due to their toxic behaviour. I didn’t want to back out of going to the school reunion, I’m no coward; I was willing to walk in and face it. When I turned up, of course Sharon wasn’t there, this was one time when I needed her to be on time for once, but of course I couldn’t rely on her. I walked into the reunion alone and I didn’t feel very comfortable being there. Thankfully Daisy was there and she found me in the dark crowded room. She grabbed my arm and pulled me into the room where the bar was. She was telling me how she was seeing this guy that she met on the internet but it was all new. She also told me that her daughter was being bullied at school (the same school we went to). Sharon later told me that one of her daughters is into boxing, I’ve seen her daughter in the local paper, that girl can kick ass (which is pretty cool). This other girl from our school noticed how nervous I was and she took me to the bar and got me a drink which helped me to relax. She was pretty cool. They only had two drinks on offer BEER and RED WINE. I don’t drink beer and I rarely drink red wine because I get drunk on half a glass of wine. I prefer to drink bourbon and coke (Jack Daniels and Coke) because that’s the drink that I can drink without causing me not to get drunk. I know I can drink a fair bit of it without getting too drunk. I have been drunk on JD and coke – don’t get me wrong, but I have to drink a lot of it to get to that stage. Red Wine is fancy and posh but it’s poison to me, it hits me like a truck.

               Daisy was a good friend to me that night and regardless of what people have told me about her, she was a great friend to me that night and I will always remember it and appreciate what she did for me.

                Not everyone from school turned up, I would say there were about half of the kids from school there and a few teachers turned up as well. Sharon and Keith eventually turned up (late as always). Sharon and Keith were nice towards me that night thankfully. I didn’t need their bullshit that night (I don’t need their bullshit any night) but the reason why they didn’t give me grief that night was because I wasn’t isolated and there were always others around (people who they didn’t know too well) and I also had Daisy with me. There were some girls that were bitchy towards me and giving Sharon and me dirty looks, but some people just remain trashy for life. There was this guy that Katie used to have a crush who she nicknamed him “Speedy Gonzales” after a cartoon character she liked. There was this other guy who was there who sort of knows this girl I know Judy (Judy didn’t go to school with us) he’s a nice guy and drives buses. My stepsister Autumn had him as a bus driver a few times and she thought he was cute. He used to get picked on sometimes as well from what I can remember. We were standing around this table outside where Sharon and Keith were smoking. He came up to us and started bitching about these people from school who were bullies. I didn’t know about it when he was doing it, I wasn’t really paying attention to him, I was chatting to Daisy. Sharon told me about it the next time we caught up. Simon had paid a photographer to turn up to take our photos and we had a group photo taken. I didn’t want my photo taken so I attempted to hide. Even though Keith didn’t go to our school he posed in our school reunion photo with us that were kinda funny. I can imagine all the kids I went to school with, trying to work out who that guy is in the photo. I didn’t drink too much that night but I don’t need to drink too much red wine for it to get me tipsy. I’m a cheap drunk (as they call it). I drank enough to lose my anxiety and by the end of the night I was taking photos of everyone. I approached my history teacher and told him I still love history and I told him how I’m a big fan of the Tudors and Anne Boleyn. He said, “Anne Boleyn is that the girl who had her head cut off?” and I said “yes”. What kind of history teacher doesn’t know who Anne Boleyn is? I think he preferred Ancient Rome and Australian history from what I remember. I remember this girl we used to hang out with in high school had a huge crush on him and she once told me that she used to ring him up on his home phone number to ask him questions relating to her school work. I didn’t think you were even allowed to do that. Sharon told me that he would have sex with his former students after they left school. I don’t know if it’s true or not.

                During the end of the night Simon and his girlfriend (who also went to our high school) gave a speech and thanked everyone for coming. It was during his speech Sharon taped me on the shoulder and told me that she and Keith had just got engaged (again). This wasn’t the first time she has told me that she and Keith had just got engaged. The first time she told me was years previously when we were at the club, we were sitting around drinking (Matthew was in England at the time) and she told me that she proposed to Keith because she said on a leap year (or something like that) it was okay for women to propose to men. Sounded like a bunch of patriarchy bullshit to me. It doesn’t matter what gender you are or what time of the year it is, if you want to ask someone to marry you just do it. She didn’t have an engagement ring that time and I don’t even recall her ever having an engagement ring or celebrating their engagement. I don’t even recall Keith saying anything about the engagement back then. So at the reunion Sharon told me she and Keith had just got engaged (she must have forgotten about the previous time they got engaged). I told her congratulations and I was happy for her and Keith. She told me the ring was still at the jewellers. They never celebrated their engagement and that was the only time it was mentioned. The engagement ring never showed up. Even though Sharon always calls him her husband, they’ve never been engaged or married.  They are probably better off not getting married, they are probably sensible that way. I think Sharon wanted to marry, but Keith was never interested.

There were a lot of people who had to travel from different states to go to this school reunion and were staying at motels. People made effort to come to this thing so it was a good turnout. Simon should be proud of what he did, it was well organised and people had a good time.

                The man Katie liked in high school, “Speedy Gonzales” started flirting with Daisy at the end of the night and they were totally into each other. I was so happy for them both, they looked so cute together. He told Daisy that he had always had a crush on her throughout school. I didn’t know it at the time, but next time I got to see Sharon she told me that Daisy and Speedy Gonzales had hooked up and she told me that Speedy Gonzales had a wife and kids at home and I thought, “WTF?” I thought he was a nice guy and he would be good for Daisy. I didn’t know he was married with kids.

                I still kept in touch with Daisy but she started getting more serious about the guy she had been seeing and stopped communicating with me. I didn’t hear from her on Facebook or in real life for about 1 or 2 years and she wasn’t posting anything online so I deleted her. I didn’t delete her to be malicious, if she wasn’t using Facebook anymore there was no point of me having her on it. I had Simon on my Facebook but he ignored me all the time so I deleted him, after I deleted him he sent me another friend request and I added him again, but he continued to ignore me again. What’s that all about? If you don’t want anything to do with someone why add them? But some people are different from me I guess. I think a lot of people just want numbers; they don’t actually care about interacting with the people they are Facebook friends with.

                A few people from school added me after the school reunion; many of them just added me so they could ignore me. People like ignoring me; they either bully me or ignore me. Some people do talk to me online and in real life and they are the only people that should matter to me.

          Simon planned another school reunion not long after the first one; I think it was less than a year after the first one. I think he did it because the school reunion was such a success that everyone was saying, “We should do this more often” and “we should do one of these every year or every five years” Simon took it on and decided to organise another one but I think it was too soon after the last one. I wanted to go because he put so much effort and organisation behind it but I had no one who wanted to go with me and I didn’t want to go alone so I decided not to go. If I had someone who would have wanted to go with me I would have turned up but even Sharon and Daisy wasn’t interested in going again. Not many people turned up to the second one and I think Simon must have been a bit bummed out about it. When people are drinking and having a good time they always say “we should do this again soon” that’s what people always say at gatherings and at family things but they never go through with it, it’s all talk (and most of the time they are talking shit). Sometimes it’s just the alcohol talking.

                In a way I just felt like I was in a room full of strangers. I remember my aunty (my mum’s sister) asking my mum how was my school reunion went because she was invited to her school reunion and she also was feeling a little concerned about going.

          I have no regrets about attending the school reunion. It was an interesting experience and I will keep those memories for a long time. This times more positive memories rather than negative memories. I remember being happy that night.

 

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