Bully Time
BULLY TIME Read this essay as originally published at Watermark.com I recently broke bread with my grade school bully. He was big for our age, even in elementary. Through junior and high school, he just got bigger and manlier and handsomer. Which made his meanness all the more sexy. I tolerated his insults like a forlorn lover. I emerged small but pudgy and wore my odd effeminacy like a chip on my shoulder. As I grew out of my grade school “husky” jeans and into my physical prime in adolescence, our paths further diverged. His toward sports, the military, and fatherhood, mine into poetry, economics, and scholarship. He introduced me to his delightful wife and kids. We talked for a long time, drank a bit, and realized that despite our divergent paths, our present-tense didn’t include torment or jealousy or insecurity. In fact, our views of ourselves and views of each other have largely converged, as one might expect, coming from the same hometown and meandering into the same prese...
