I despise bullies. They’re all cut from the same cloth; mean, stupid, and cowardly, good for nothing but making trouble. They prey on the weak. They bow to the strong.
Their swagger masks their lack of confidence. They’re quick to find something else to do when they’re faced with the possibility of being bloodied.
I learned this in school, on the playground.
Dicky Lantz and his side-kick, Gerald Tyler, terrorized my fifth-grade class. They were a head and a half taller than the rest of us, and two years older. They’d been held back for failure to meet graduation standards. They lorded it over all of us until a new kid arrived from Florida.
His name was Dan Kutcher. He was tanned from the Florida sun. We were pasty-white from the overcast northern sky. The girls took to him immediately. He was good-looking and good natured. The boys liked him, too.
He wore his shirt with collar and sleeves casually unbuttoned as though the shirt was an unwanted formality.
Dicky and Gerald sized him up. He was taller than the rest of the class, but shorter than them. They made their usual play on the playground at recess. Dicky shoved Dan, saying, “Did your momma forget to button your shirt”?
Dan hit Dickie in the mouth.
He hit Dicky hard enough to stagger him backward with blood dripping from his chin. Dan said nothing. Dicky and Gerald never bothered Dan again. They never bothered the rest of us either. Whenever they tried, Dan would look up and walk toward them. They wanted no part in fights that left them bleeding.
It was a lesson.
Dicky and Gerald might have ganged-up on Dan and beat him. They didn’t. They knew that even if they whipped him they would pay a price for their victory. Bullies are cowards. They pick on the weak and timid. They stay away from the brave.
I think everyone in my fifth-grade class walked away with a new understanding of what can be gained by facing fear with courage.
Years later, in my ninth-grade literature class I read these lines: “Cowards die many times before their deaths; The valiant never taste of death but once” – Julius Caesar, Act II, Scene 2.
Shakespeare wrote beautifully what I already knew.
Dan Kutcher taught me that in fifth-grade.