The Ant Bully

our most excellent friend, will, chose this week's topic: bullying.

i am aware there is a movie called the ant bully, but i've not seen it, and this is not what my title refers to. friends, i am a bully magnet. from birth, i have been bullied by my sisters and then their friends. in school, mean people (like carolyn shinsky) could verbally assault me (by saying doctors are all greedy jerks and their daughters are rich spoiled brats) and not only would i not retaliate, i would make efforts to win the bully's favor. in high school, i was often the "best friend" of the moody, pushy girl who would turn on me in a moment's notice, accusing me of not calling her back, not saving her a seat at lunch, or whatever. i have learned to live with pain in my stomach over the stress and walking on eggshells so as to not provoke the wrath of bullies.

but what does a lonely, stepped-on young girl do with all her rage? i took it out on ants.

frequently while growing up, i would step in an anthill and have to run and jump in the pool (yes, i had a pool - i was a spoiled doctor's daughter) to get the swarming fire ants off of my feet. our backyard was like a minefield of dirt mounds filled with the biting pests. in the evenings before dinner, i often armed myself with a bag of doritos, a metal stake, and a can of raid and entered my backyard on a mission to seek and destroy the pure evil that awaited me - fire ants.

i used the stake to disrupt the mound. i then threw a few doritos on top of the mess, and the ants would gather and cling to them, sucking in all the processed cheese powder they could. i waited. i watched them carrying eggs, scurrying around, wondering what had happened to their peace and quiet, pleased at the free gift of junk food. once the ants were out in full force, and the doritos were covered with little red bodies, i sprayed. not lightly - i sprayed until little pools of poison collected on the doritos and ants were curled up and floating. i sprayed every ant i could see, holding the button down until my finger turned white, and it hurt, and the mound was wet, the fumes invading my nose with deep pleasure. i think i clenched my teeth.

the problem was, i never killed the queen. in a day or so, the mound would resurface a few feet away, and my process would repeat. but i suppose my anger never went away, only worsened, and my attempted solution failed because i never really got at the root of the problem. i could still kill ants today, with no less momentary satisfaction.

perhaps i could imagine all my bullies as ants, biting at my feet, leaving sore, itchy blisters. i could offer them a dorito, then spray them in the face with raid. but then again, they would probably just resurface a day or two later.