Never Ever Ever

OK, so I know I wrote an “Urban Legends Part 1” - believe me, there is definitely a Part 2 coming that has to do with more roof tops and subway tracks, but I feel a bit out of time. All of these posts have a time lag. For example, as I've written this, I am back in Chicago to pick up my boxed belongings from my former apartment. However, I have this one done for whatever reason, and I'd like to post it for any lovely readers who keep reading. It takes place as I'm about to leave Boston, anyway:

I met a wise man and his name was George.

I first encountered him while walking to Boston's South Station to catch my 10 PM MegaBus back to D.C. I felt tired, out of place, and sad like I had lost something but couldn't remember what had been lost. I sized up other people on the street, hoping for a reference point, some flaw to make me feel better about myself.

George had combed-back white hair, a shiny forehead, a huge gap of missing top row teeth, and bulbous blue eyes. I was walking a few steps behind him with my luggage as a line of three people, strung out across the sidewalk, approached us from the opposite direction. Rather than sidestep or angle himself between the group, George fluttered his hands in front of his face as if a giant moth had just attacked his head. My luggage and I followed him through the gap he had created in the group.

Within a few seconds, I was side by side with him. He muttered something and kept pace with me. I cooed and grunted something soothing. He hummed back and asked “are you lost?”

“I don't know,” I lied and sped up my pace.

“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO,” George yelled. A sane-looking pedestrian crossing the street laughed at him. I couldn't smile – George's bellow sounded desolate, lonely, forsaken.

I sped up my pace even more and heard a distant “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO” again. When I looked back, I saw George flutter his hands in front of his face again as his forehead lightly bumped a street pole. I wondered if he needed glasses.

I learned his name because he later said “My name is George. My name is George. My name is George. My name is George.” I think he was saying that to everyone and to no one in particular.

This name-learning happened about 20 minutes later, since I had spent that time circumnavigating South Station, guided by my horrible directional instincts. If you ever ask me where to go and I say right, then you should probably go left. Anyway, I somehow eventually put two and two together and walked into the corner building with the huge South Station sign over a series of double doors. After buying a generic but generous amount of Chinese food at the station's eatery, I situated myself at a table with a lone chair.

There was a group of four people, two guys and two girls about my age, occupying two tables to my left. One of the guys was talking about European taxation practices versus United States procedures; he was speaking in a lecturing tone, the sort of tone I had used with my ex when I wanted to expound upon some topic for which I had little to no research or experience in.

George was sitting behind me with what I took to be a big meal. After he left that seat and a South Station worker cleaned up the table soon after, I realized that it had just been trash. He pulled up a chair and sat next to the cuter girl in the group of four. The lecturing guy kept on speaking and pretended not to notice George.

“I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Hey, I'm sorry,” George said as he touched the girl very lightly and cautiously on the forearm.

“No it's OK. It's fine,” she said and tried not to shift away. They repeated this same back and forth response several times over the next two minutes. Why didn't she ask him what he was sorry for? Were you sorry for not wanting to be invisible, George?

The group of four eventually decided to vacate the tables that George had tried to share. The girl next to George told him to have a good night – the group of four reconvened about fifty feet away. Thus, I was left with George sitting to my left. I halfheartedly stirred my honey chicken, mashed my soggy green beans, and chewed absently on a few more forkfuls of greasy noodles before giving up and staring into space.

I had tried to prolong my travels by buying a series of excruciatingly long bus tickets that would allow me to stop over in Washington D.C. for a day and night. But this first round of travels was admittedly coming to a close – I had had adventures and minor revelations, but I didn't feel changed.

“Are you going to finish that off?” George asked me.

“No, please take it,” I said and handed the styrofoam platter to him. He ate daintily and didn't pay much attention to me. Perhaps I was the invisible one.

“So you said your name was George?” I ventured.

“Yeah, George, George Adelman,” he said.

“I'm Robert, Robert Egan,” I replied. We shook hands and fell silent for awhile. I eventually asked him where he was from and told him that I was traveling. We made small, disjoint talk before he sighed and put down his plastic fork.

“You know it's hard. It can be really hard. I'm not a bad guy – really I'm not a bad guy,” he said. He stayed turned toward me and his huge blue eyes searched my face.

“Well, no one's really bad or good. I mean you can say that people are bad in some ways but good in others. And who's to say who's bad and who's good?” I said.

“You're being an asshole,” George replied.

“Right now?” I asked.

“Uh-huh.”

“Oh, OK.” I supposed that I could have come off as patronizing while I theorized on bad and good. Hell, I had started using that same lecturing tone that the guy from the group of four had been using earlier.

“Listen, I'm not a bad guy. I have never ever ever made fun of someone,” George said. His blue eyes twitched from side to side as he gauged my facial expression to see if I understood. I guess I didn't because he continued speaking and pointing out people. “You see that guy over there, carrying all the drinks. I could say 'look at that asshole.' Or that guy cleaning the tables 'what a jerk.' But I don't. All these people in here, they're trying. And who knows where you'll be in ten years. It doesn't matter – you never ever ever make fun of someone.”

“I've made fun of people before,” I said.

I remembered some of the extreme instances when I had done just that, mostly junior high and early high school. There had been a kid with a neat, semi-froggy voice whom I had mocked incessantly. Other classmates with funny names or funny faces were subjected to humiliating doodles, movie references, and nicknames. On an eighth grade trip to Washington D.C. I was part of a group that included a wheelchair-bound kid who was slightly overweight. I and another friend came up with a nickname for him – FAF or Fat Ass Fuck; there was even a poem and everything. Awful.

“You said that you made fun of them,” George asked.

“Yeah, but I wish that I had never made fun of anyone,” I said.

I hadn't been a full-time bully and had been bullied myself, but I had been the worst kind of bully in the above instances. I had done my best to make others feel ashamed of what they could not or didn't want to change. I had tried to rob them of their basic human dignity. I had felt out of place then. Now, I was waiting for a bus to Washington D.C. a decade later, and I still felt out of place.

“Now you just contradicted your own self,” George continued.

“No, I said that I wish I had never made fun – oh,” I said.

Was I contradicting myself? Had I ever stopped making fun? I no longer gave people ignoble nicknames, but from time to time I've caught myself putting people down silently, smugly. Was I more handsome than that guy across the street? Would I ever let myself go completely to fat like the lady waddling up her driveway? How many people within a quarter-mile radius had a dick as big as mine? If we had to fight to the death, then who would win? Was the guy serving me coffee as smart as me? What is the best way to pick up on people's imperfections so that I can feel more awesome, slightly less out of place? 'Look at that asshole.' 'What a jerk.'

“I bet you think you're smarter than me,” George said.

“I never said that,” I replied.

“You're about 20, right?” he asked.

“I'm 23. I know that I have a long ways to go,” I said.

“No, don't say that. You're smart. You just never ever ever make fun of someone,” he said.

“I'll try. I mean, I won't. Thank you. I have to catch my bus. Thanks,” I said. George didn't say anything and went back to eating calmly.

I thanked George because he had pinpointed a major source of unhappiness so elegantly – insecurity, the fear that I'll never be good enough. You start trying to find ways to feel superior to others. The catch is that there will always be someone who is better at some part of life than you'll ever be. You can block that out and focus on people who are worse or just less experienced in the things you've decided to take pride in. You can pick your comparisons carefully and try to design categories where you'll always win.

But if comparing yourself to others is all that you can do, then you cease to be your own person. Take responsibility – you're good enough when you believe you're good enough. No one else can decide that for you.

That personal control, what makes me me, is what I sometimes feel has been lost and forgotten in the losing. It's always a relief when I realize that it's just been waiting patiently. Whatever uncertainty or loss may follow, I'll always have that.

Look around you – short, fat, tall, skinny, ugly, weak, strong, young, old, beautiful, stupid, smart, slow, fast, dark, light, straight, gay, bisexual, poor, rich, saved, damned, two-balled, one-balled, no-balled. Enjoy - laugh but don't make fun. Never ever ever.