Well, here it is. Going out with a bang.
Tyson.
I actually always liked the name Tyson. For some reason I thought it would be funny to name my kid "Tyson." Get it? Son of Ty? I thought it was brilliant, and I still do, dammit.
So there were two Tyson's at my high school. One of them was a great athlete who would eventually get drafted by the Pittsburgh Pirates (though he never made it to the majors). I played football with him starting with two-hand touch in elementary school, and going on through the 9th grade. He was the starting quarterback at our high school, and generally an all-around nice guy.
The other Tyson was a douche. I have very few people that I feel this way about, but he was definitely one of them. It's quite possible that I'm not being fair to Tyson. I don't know. I'll let you decide, by way of a very, very skewed re-telling of my time around him.
I can't remember with certainty my first run-in with Tyson. But, from the get-go, I could tell we were never going to be "buddies." Tyson was the prototypical jock. He was the "alpha-male" type. The cocky football-playing meat-headed bullying punk. He was like that blond kid in Napoleon Dynamite:
Apparently the actor who played "Don" was an Air-Force reservist. Tyson was not.
Good lord, he even looked like that kid. Anyhow, Tyson was a popular kid that (from what I can recall) was barely tolerated by the other popular kids at the school. But somehow, through sheer force of meat-headry and arrogance, he was accepted as one of them.
Anyway, the first run-in that I actually do remember was 8th grade gym class, in Junior High. We already covered that I had a hell of a time in the 8th grade, for whatever reason (if I had to pick a low point in my life, that was it). Now, Tyson was not actually in my gym class; he was in another class sharing the gym during that period. So I didn't have to spend a trimester being pestered by him -- just a couple of days.
Because the two gym classes linked for a "basketball tournament." Now, if you'll remember from Part 1 of this series, I suck hard at basketball. The tournament format was "2 on 2", and the hell if I can remember the poor sucker I was paired with. But in the first round we faced off against Tyson and...some other jock-y dude.
Right off the bat things went bad. Tyson's team started with possession of the ball, and for some weird reason, instead of jumping right in and starting the game, he passed me the ball. I thought to myself, "What the hell? Why's he giving me the ball? Is this one of those 'I'll give you the first punch' kind of moments?" So, taking the bait, I turned around to take a shot.
Which made Tyson laugh his high-pitched laugh (you know, the one all bullies have?). He proceeded to (condescendingly) tell me that he was "checking" the ball. This is, apparently, something you do when you are playing a half-court basketball game. The team with possession passes the ball to a defending team member...who then passes the ball back to the team with possession. This is done instead of the in-bounds pass.
Here's an example...about 30 seconds in...
Well, I'm sure you're not surprised to hear that we got annihilated, with Tyson mocking me all the way. But, it wasn't so bad -- I didn't have to deal with the guy every day (as I say, he was in a different class), so aside from some minor embarrassment, I was able to ignore the taunts.
Football was a different story. In the 7th and 8th grade I played Pop Warner Football, and my position was "offensive line." At that age the o-line is where they put the fat kids, and the kids who were terrible athletes. I must have given off the "egghead" vibe pretty early, because that's where they stuck me too.
But the difference was, I was a damn fine offensive lineman. I was quick off of the line, and I made good blocks. I played the interior line (guard) position, and I was rarely ever beat by a defensive lineman. I learned the technique fairly well, but I just had a series of terrible coaches. They were more interested in telling the kids to go out and "bust heads" than in actually teaching the mechanics of the game. I didn't know the difference between a 4-3 and a 3-4 defense! Can you believe that? Stay with me, Erika...this will be over soon...
So, consequently, the athletic rejects on the o-line would launch off the line and bust the heads of the defensive linemen...while the linebackers would just wait until the running back hit the hole, then make the tackle. No one ever told us to block the linebackers. No one ever really told us anything, other than to go out there and hit someone. Stupid.
I've digressed. Basically, it goes like this: I was a good, smart, technical player who never got a chance to show off his ability...because my coaches were awful. Having endured that for two long years, I decided in the 9th grade to go out for the actual Jr. High Football team (no more Pop Warner for me).
I remember the "tryouts." I was put with the second-team squad, while all of the returning 9th graders (the ones who played on the 8th grade school team while I was playing Pop Warner) were on the first-team squad. The coaches put us through a couple of drills, and taught us a couple of plays. Then they had us run those plays over and over. I decided that, even though I was a little under-sized, I'd go out for offensive line again
So as we were running plays, I'd fire off with every snap. They'd tell us to reset, and I'd be the first guy back on the line, and the first guy to shoot off the line when a new play started. Unlike the Pop Warner retards, my Jr. High coaches very good, insightful, smart guys. They called out one of the guys on the first team (poor kid named Jaurdey) and told me to take his place. I did, and I never went back. I was on the varsity squad all through the 9th grade season.
And how it worked was, even though there were about 50 kids on the squad, only 12 kids played on varsity (they'd play "both ways;" on offense and defense). I was one of those 12, and for my defensive position I chose "linebacker," because I wanted to be the guy who the stupid, fat offensive linemen would forget to block.
Problem. Tyson (remember him?) was also on varsity. Tyson was also a linebacker. Tyson was the only guy on that squad who thought I didn't belong. So Tyson tried like hell to make my life miserable
Luckily for me, Tyson wasn't as good as he thought he was...and I was better than he thought I was. So, instead of being able to knock me down "where I belonged," he had to resort to more...well...stupid means.
For example, he'd be the first one to point out any mistakes I'd make. This was not easy for him, though, since (as I mentioned) he wasn't a very smart player. So any time he'd try to do this, more often than not he'd be wrong. But...he kept trying. He'd cackle his little bully cackle and call me out, only to be met by the indifference of his teammates and coaches. However, in his mind I still did not belong...so he kept at it.
Before each game, each position coach would run little "drills" on the sidelines to keep their players fresh. The linebackers had a drill where one person would get a football, and the other person would run at them (from an angle) and make the initial hit of a tackle (without following through to actually tackle the other person). It was all about "wrapping" the ball carrier up...but since we were going to be playing a game, we weren't supposed to actually tackle the other guy, because it could injure them. And really, we needed to save ourselves for the game.
But guess what. I was designated as a "ball carrier" at a certain point, and Tyson was the "tackler." I ran. He chased me down and full-on tackled me. Not hard, mind you, because (as I mentioned) he wasn't great at football. But it was totally unnecessary. Our position coach told him "just wrap up, Tyson". And Tyson made a non-committal noise and took his turn as a ball carrier.
We cycled through again, and once again, lined up against Tyson, I was full-on tackled. The coach asked Tyson why he was tackling, and Tyson told him he was "just getting pumped for the game." But I'd seen Tyson run this drill before, and I was the only one he considered tackle-worthy. Obviously, to me, he was just being a prick.
So, as much as I could that year, I avoided Tyson. He was the inside linebacker, and I was the outside-linebacker -- so it was hard to do. But, since we were teammates, there wasn't a lot of opportunity for him to pester me. And I think he pretty much gave up anyway, because...as I say...I turned out to be a better athlete than he thought I'd be.
I made it through football with Tyson. He never really laid in to me, but he burned an awful lot of calories trying to tear me down. And for whatever reason, he seemed to enjoy picking on me. It's not like I ever did anything to make him mad, other than to "exist" in his realm of influence, hence...he was the most prototypical bully I was to come up against in school.
This made my heart sink when I took an "Acting / Improv" class in the 10th grade, and saw Tyson walk into class on the first day. Acting was something I'd always loved, and Improv is something that completely depends on a level of comfort with your fellow actors. I couldn't avoid associating with him now...he'd be there every day. Just waiting for the chance to embarrass me.
It came immediately. First day. We were "introducing" ourselves to the class. Each member of the class was to go up front and say a little bit about themselves, then the class was to ask them questions. Like an interview, except with your classmates running the show.
I got up. I happened to be wearing a simple navy blue t-shirt that said "GEORGE FOX COLLEGE" in big bold letters. So, I introduced myself. And got to the question and answer phrase. Tyson's hand shot up.
"So...have you been to George Fox College?"
"Oh." I looked at my shirt. "I've never been. My sister goes to school there. She got me this shirt."
"So...do you like George Fox College?"
I get it. He's making fun of my shirt. "Sure. It's okay, I guess."
"Do you want to go to George Fox College?"
"I don't know."
Mercifully, someone else jumped in with a question, and we moved on. I actually kind of felt embarrassed for him at the time. He did one of those stupid "snicker and look around the room" moves, but no one reacted to him. He was the sole "popular" kid in the room. There was no one to back up his mockery. He was in my world now.
So I took a few more questions and we moved on. Over the next couple of days we did some simple improv games -- freeze tag, what are you doing?, story story die...all the stuff you learn in amateur improv classes. I was one of the better actors in the class, and I noticed that Tyson pretty much laid off me. I'd have scenes with him, and it was as if we were any other improv scene partners. It was pretty remarkable. He'd laugh at my jokes, and vice versa.
After about a week of this, we did this exercise where we were supposed to blindfold one person, and have another person lead them all over the school. Each member of the class was given a partner. Naturally, I was paired with Tyson. He was blindfolded first.
I led him around, joked around with him a little bit, and he joked back. It was bizarre. This kid that I'd lived in fear of for about three years was laughing and joking around with me. After about 10 minutes of this, we switched up, and it was my turn to take the blindfold.
Alarm klaxons fired off in my head. This was the douchebag who thought it'd be funny to tackle me before a football game. The kid who hectored me relentlessly during a game of pickup basketball. The kid who made fun of my shirt in front of the entire class. Now he was going to be leading me around the school, blindfolded?
But my compliant personality took over, and off we went. There were a lot of kids around, because the first lunch period (of three) was being taken. Some of those kids were my friends, and they started messing with me. One of them grabbed at me (with Tyson laughing the whole time). I reached out to push him, and accidentally punched 6'7 center of our female basketball team in the boob.
I only found this out afterwards, because I was blindfolded. Also, after I punched her blindly, she shoved me hard into a wall...and I took my blind fold off to see who I'd hit. Tyson laughed the entire time...this time out of amusement, not derision. It was pretty funny -- getting my blind-folded ass kicked by a girl, who was 7 inches taller than me, and outweighed me by a good fifty pounds.
Of course, the trimester eventually came to an end, and we each retreated to our separate cliques. Tyson and I didn't become any closer friends, because he was still an asshole...he just wasn't an asshole to me any more. This was the first of many times where I found that, if I just found something I was passionate about and did that thing, I'd somehow get respect from people.
But after the 10th grade, I never had a problem with bullies. I still traveled in the same social circles -- I enjoyed the company of "nerds," but really found more of a home with the "smart-asses." I was comfortable around the popular kids, but I never really hung out with any of them (not that I ever really tried, or wanted to, though).
And I just started doing the things I really liked doing. I stopped playing football after the 9th grade season (the highschool coach tried to recruit me...but I wanted to play in the Marching Band far more than I wanted to be around meat-heads like Tyson). I got into drama. I was a good drummer, and an even better actor, and I think that kids that age can still appreciate talent...even if they desperately want to find something to ridicule. I know that it worked for Tyson -- if he'd have never seen me in my natural habitat, he probably still would have tried to bully me throughout my high school years. But we all grows up.
For me, that was a big part of it. Find something you like, and something you're good at, and just do that thing...and people will respect you for it. Even jag-offs like Tyson.
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