I was popular in grade school. Tall, funny...and quick with a nasty joke about someone. I had it easy.

Then my parents split and I was uprooted and moved from a school in an academic area to a rural school in Kentucky. Karma is a filthy whore, but she knows what she's doing.

I was bullied for knowing how to pronounce words, for not having an accent, for being weak, for the music I liked...I had to fight often. I learned to win unless they sent girls after me, which I was taught never to hit. They clawed at my face and pulled out my hair in clumps. The teachers did nothing, thinking I needed to get a thick skin quick or I'd never make it. I once got challenged to a fight by a kid and I fought him and won. He ratted me out to his parents, I got called to the principal's office the next day. I said, "I tried to get him to meet me after school but he'd never show up. So what am I supposed to do? Just take the beating?" He knew I was drowning in rednecks, but he just said nothing and sent me back to class with a warning.

After that grade ended, I moved to a middle school in a different county. It was marginally better, but I was still the outcast. Picked on for not being good at or liking sports, for having moles, for reading books, for answering questions in class. My now single mother couldn't afford Nikes or Polo shirts so I was sporting generic shoes from Shoe Carnival and factory seconds with holes sewn closed by my mom. My clothes were a constant target.

I learned a lot about myself. I learned to take a punch. I learned to give a punch back, even if I wasn't sure if I'd win the fight. I learned to be funnier and to laugh at myself without going too far down the self-deprecating rabbit hole. I learned to judge people by their actions and character rather than their appearance.

High school got better as I got older. I was still cynical, but I reserved my biting wit for those that started after me first. Still, I could have done better and been kinder, but I certainly wasn't the bastard I had been. To be clear, I'm not a saint made by the crucible of bullying, but I definitely got taken down a peg or two and realized that we're all just trying to get through the day and hoping that tomorrow might be a little better.