The following is a short message directed at the bullies
who bullied me in middle and high school. I also hope other bully victims can
understand what I am about to say and can commiserate and even take as an affirmation
for themselves.
To
my bullies in from school,
You
made my life miserable in school. But you know what. I don’t hate you. I have
no enmity or animosity towards you. Life is too short to hold grudges, and I no
longer see you and most likely never will see you again, what you did was in
the past. No, what I feel for you isn’t anger. I want no personal revenge
against you. I wish no bad things to happen to you in the future. I’m sure you
live with what you did, and hope you personally feel remorse or regret and
hopefully moved past your childish deeds. Sure you thought what you did made
you seem “cool” back then, but I hope you realize what you did wasn’t okay.
What I feel for you is this: pity. I’m sorry you felt that to be popular you
insulted and belittled me. Those “friends” you thought you had? Those weren’t
your friends. Those people who sided with you also wanted to be cool and
popular, so they gravitated towards you. The friends I had? Those were friends.
They hung out with me, not to be cool or popular, but because they really
wanted to have a friend. So honestly, in school, you didn’t have friends. I
did. I wouldn’t want to go to life without friends. Now, I hope you’ve grown up
since then, and learned what having a friend really means, and that those
people you bullied have grown stronger and learned not to hate you. Because I
don’t. I don’t hate you. And on top of that, I forgive you. You may have
brought me down then, but you gave me a gift for later on in my life. You gave
me strength. I grew strong each time you called me a name, or pulled a prank.
And I never wanted to be you, or be like you. I just wanted to be me. And I am
me. Everything you did changed my life, and all those years, it turned out to
be positive. And I hope you’ve learned true friendship, because if you haven’t,
bullying didn’t destroy life, it destroyed yours. So I say what you thought you
would never hear from me: thank you. And I hope you grew up to be at least half
the person I grew up to be.
Sincerely yours,
Timothy Cubbin
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