Personal Narrative

I haven't blogged in a while...

Well I figured I'd just post my personal narrative, in its rough draft form. I think it came out pretty well...It's long but it reads fast.


The back door of my suburban abode slammed with a thud. I was off to the football field. As I walked through backyard after backyard in the melting February snow, I asked myself why I was doing this. I didn’t even like football. I couldn’t help that I was the least aggressive person I knew. The wet snow began to seep into my shoes as I contemplated my reasoning.
“Should I turn back?”, I asked myself.
“Are you a man?”, testosterone retorted.
I was halfway there and was wearing my Green Bay Packers jersey, I wasn’t turning back.
“The Packer’s ehy? Have you even watched a full Packers game before?”, testosterone asked.
“No, but I’ve watched portions of their games a few...many times.” I stammered.
I was beginning to hear the voices of my peers a few yards away.
“Okay, hopefully Adam isn’t here today,” I said under my breath.
“Pass the ball you pansy!”, a faint voice shouted. Adam was there.
My heart skipped a beat. Adam was my bully at the time. Derek had moved last year, so the position was open. Adam quickly filled the duty within a few weeks of Derek absence. My feet were completely soaked by the time I reached the football field. I was never greeted with any harsh words. It was always, “Dressman’s here”. This always left an air of suspense, “Will today be one of the bad days, or will I be spared?” I would soon find out; the insults usually came once the game started.
“We’re playing smear the queer, you’re it.”
I was liking Adam’s style. He was straight and to the point. He let you know what kind of day it was going to be right away. Derek on the other hand, stretched out the process. He gradually built up suspense and then swooped down on you right when you thought you made through the day. So in a way, you could say Adam was an improvement.
Each bully I had singled me out for some reason. Okay, I was a little chubby, but other than that I was a pretty nice kid. They just saw me as an easy target I guess. The worst part of the bullying was that all of my friends took the bully’s side. After he left, of course, they casually acted as if nothing had even happened and we were back on good terms. I never said anything to them because they were always good friends when he wasn’t around. That seemed reasonable to me.
The object of Smear the Queer is to tackle the one with the ball. The one with the ball has to keep from being tackled. And so Smear the Queer began, and within a few moments, ended. I was used to it, give the worst kid the ball a few times, easy target: just to boost the confidence and get the juices flowing. If I had been one of the aggressive, I probably would have done it too. But I wasn’t.
“Don’t you guys ever get tired of using me,” I said to Adam and his posse, “I mean you know I’m the weakest player.”
“You know, I don’t know, it’s just fun for some reason. Now stop being a little pussy and get up and actually try.”, Adam sneered.
On a normal day, Adam and my “friends” would mess around with me for the first part of the day, and then get tired of it. We would then proceed to play a regular football game and forget about all the abuse. But today was different. We never got around to playing a regular football game. We played side-swipe the “pansy” in the Packers jersey, over and over again.
Each time the ball was kicked off to me, I would scramble to pick up the ball, and then run as far away from the wave of pain as I could before ultimately being smothered into the ground. I knew the taste of grass and snow all too well. Before I knew what had happened, the ball was being kicked off again. I stumbled up off the ground and hastily picked up the football. Adam, now driving what looked to be a chariot pulled by twelve-year-olds was rushing towards me at full force. This time, I instinctively jumped out of the way right before he could spear through me. Before I could congratulate myself on the smooth move, his posse fell on top of me, one-by-one.
“Ugh! Get the hell off me!” I commanded wearily. I was a pretty tolerant person, but I just couldn’t take any more of this. I wasn’t so much angry at Adam as I was my friends. I had successfully juked out Goliath, and did my friends congratulate me on the move? No, they decided to have some sort of testosterone orgy on top of my face. I never usually got too angry when this sort of thing happened, but today was different. I was really mad. I was so angry that I was going to...get up and begin my long trek home. Who was I kidding, I wasn’t going to do anything.
Before I could start my pity party for myself, a football hit the back of my head. I turned around and saw Adam and my “friends” laughing. I don’t know how long I stood and watched them joke before they turned to go their separate ways, but it seemed like forever. All the while, the anger and frustration was building up inside of me. Without realizing it, I bent down and scooped up a large ball of snow.
Summers were always fun for me. There was the occasional bullying but other than that we played baseball every day. I was actually good at baseball. In fact, I was one of the best in the neighborhood. I was great at batting, and I always had the game-saving catch out in the field. Since I was so good, no one ever messed around with me. Until football season rolled around, the baseball diamond was my refuge. How does this fit into the story you may be asking. Well, I was a great pitcher. I had near-perfect aim and a good arm. Now that you know that bit of information, what I did back on the football field seems plausible.
Before I could talk myself out of it, I hurled a snowball the length of the football field, thinking it would maybe come close to hitting someone. It did. It came really close. Close enough to hit Adam in the side of the face. I watched in horror as the snowball exploded just below Adam’s eye.
And so Smear the Queer began again. Except this time I probably wouldn’t just be tackled, I’d be beaten until you couldn’t tell if it was me or the ground. All I could do was run. I sprinted through a few backyards and then frantically crawled under someone’s deck. Adam ran past the deck breathing heavily. Thankfully it was just him, the posse was probably still in shock back at the field. As I sat under the deck trying not to breath, I heard his heavy panting and saw his menacing legs make their way past the deck numerous times. Each time he went by his panting increased and his speed was reduced. Finally he walked by tiredly, cursing under his rapid breathing. I decided it was safe to come out after he didn’t pass by the deck again. I slowly crept out from underneath my wooden castle, stepped over my moat of bushes, and inched along the sides of the house. I jumped behind a bush when I got to the front of the house, scouting out my path home. My stomach felt like it was about to jump out of my skin. I considered just hiding behind the bushes for a few days. My stomach did a flip as I saw Adam walk along with his posse a few yards over. It looked like he had given up. At least that’s what I told myself before I was up and running across the yard towards my house, three backyards ahead. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Adam, now a charging locomotive heading straight towards my yard. “He’s going to cut me off, I’m going to die,” I told myself. I kept my eyes locked on my back door as I ran directly towards it. Two yards away.
Somehow I was ahead of Adam by ten feet, one backyard away from my house. I felt him grab for my jersey, the tips of his fingers clawing at my back. Just then, the adrenaline kicked in, his hand quickly loosing grip of the jersey. I raced ahead, now a few feet in front of him.
I saw my back door, “Oh God, is it locked,” I thought to myself. I grabbed for the handle and forced my way in, at the same time closing the door behind me. I turned around to see Adam, enraged, staring through the glass door at me. Trying to catch my breath, I limped over to his figure still standing on the doorstep and turned the lock. He accepted defeat and walked away. I sat down and replayed the whole ordeal in my mind. Austin-1, Adam-0.