As a kid, I was REALLY good at being mean. This is something that I didn't quite understand for a while, and that I often conflated with standing up for myself or my friends. Truth be told, part of me still thinks the way I remember events was right, but now I'm less sure.

I'm a comic, and have always been blessed with a certain glibness, but nothing seemed to activate me quite like throwing shade at somebody who I thought deserved it. There was an electricity that I'm not sure I can even describe, but it was like that three-brain meme and when I got to take somebody down, my mind lit up like a firework show. To the point where by 18, I was almost AFRAID to open my mouth around people I disliked, and found a vow of silence more palatable than destroying a person for the grave sin of being somebody I kind of disliked. I look back at the trajectory of my childhood and cringe, as kids who I remember "standing up to" have accused me of being their bully. I know in my heart I've never sought out a person just to openly mock them, but I wonder about the "feuds" I had throughout my childhood, and ones where I might have overstepped my bounds.

In sixth grade, there was a girl I remember not getting along with (who was short, which will be relevant to the story in a moment), and at some point, I said something along the lines of, "you look like a Keebler Elf fucked the stump they live in and somehow got it pregnant". A zinger to be sure, but not TOO scathing, except her dad had just died and it really hit home for me that what makes people unpleasant could be VERY reasonable, and that what you say to people can effect them in profound and unforeseen ways.

It was that exact moment, where I vowed never to use my gifts for evil (the gift of being marginally funny) -- and never just to get a laugh. I'll admit to a few slip-ups in the following years, middle school and high school are difficult, but that became an ideal that I constantly strove to be.