Violence stops in seventh grade.

I started this blog with the intention of posting a memory every day, or at the very least, every other day. Because sometimes random ones hit me, and they're things I don't really want to forget, but have no reason to remember. This one hit me the other day at work, and I really wanted to explore some of the questions that came along with it.

When I was in seventh grade, one of the few friends I had was a girl named Jessica. I don't think she actually liked me very much. I was the new kid (yet again) and this time, we had moved to a VERY large school--over 700 kids for grades 6,7, & 8. She already had friends, and I must admit, I was never what one could consider a 'cool' kid--although I hope that's changed somewhat since then!

We were sitting in the cafeteria one day eating lunch, surrounded by her group of girl friends. Trying to be a good friend, I noticed that her usually-perfect coif had a loop in it, in the back, where she really couldn't see it. It seemed that a few strands had caught back on themselves. So trying to be subtle and a good friend, I reached up and slipped a finger through it, pulling down. It was with the same innocence and intention as when you fix the tag on the back of a friend's shirt. That is not how she took it.

It turns out, that small loop of "caught strands" was actually the end of a little braid she had threaded into her normally polished hairstyle. How was I to know this? She thought I was trying to pull it out. Embarrassed in front of her friends, she reached back and yanked my ponytail holder out of it's secure hold, MORTIFYING me. I, who was painfully aware of how my hair never looked good and a ponytail was the pinnacle of my hair stylings, saw nothing but cruelty in her reaction. I was, and still am sometimes, easily embarrassed. And as any woman who has ever had to pass through the humiliations that come with being an awkward pubescent seventh-grader, it was ten times worse because I was honestly only trying to be a good friend and she ripped her claws across my back. I can't forget that--how my actions were punished. It is still a sad and painful thing to recall, eleven years later.

Why bring this up? Why relive this in a blog? Because I started thinking about the inherent violence in Jessica's retaliation. We were still young enough that eyebrows didn't raise at her reaction. Nobody understood the finer details of the momentary interaction but in their mind, her actions were justifiable. She never apologized for it either. I don't think we were friends for very much longer. But my point is--at what age do we begin to learn that violence is not an acceptable retaliation? Of course we tell little children 'no hitting', but go to any schoolyard, any playground, and you will see a hierarchy determined by the effectiveness of one's fists. Even girls do it--sometimes older women claw out eyes and pull hair as they screech. But those moments are the exceptions, not the rules.

Is it once we reach high school? I seem to remember eighth grade being a humiliation composed of mostly words or ill-fitting clothes, but not of physical retribution. At what point do we begin to recognize the social mores that say we should not answer with our fists or feet but with our eyes and our mouths? It's so interesting to me too--how the level of humiliation corresponds to the level of violence. I'm no psychologist, and so I provide no answers. There were just a few questions I needed to get out of my head.