Nora Farmer

English 10- D Block

Mrs. Volpe
February 14, 2016
Girls can be Tough, Too
Bang. I pushed Jack straight up onto the wall.
Dont ever call me that again! I bent Jacks arms back and walked up the stairs with my friend,
Danielle. I was walking fast enough so that the teacher didnt see what happened. Danielle
looked at me like I had just broken her phone. Nora, that was awesome! Not the answer I was
expecting.
What? I dont want him calling me that anymore, I am sick of it! I yelled.
My face was red and my hand was in a fist. I wanted to rip my own hair out. Danielle and I
walked faster to avoid the teachers eyes. The weekend before, I had dyed my hair red, but I
didn't know that when I did, I would have the same color hair as my tech ed teacher. I was being
called Mrs. Anset all day and it was annoying and I didnt look like her at all. After school, I
decided to bleach my hair back to normal, but my mom found out.
Nora, what are you doing?
Um...Nothing mom.
Really, because it looks like you are bleaching your hair.
Okay, I am.
Why?
People at school are making fun of my hair.

Oh, sweetie, who cares what people think of your hair. The important thing is that you like it,
right?
Right! I wanted to stop trying to impress people and not care about what other people called
me. I didnt want anyone in my grade to be scared of me just because I have anger issues. After
that incident with Jack, he would walk in the other direction and avoid eye contact in class. I
was getting help from my guidance counselor about my anger issues and I was getting better. I
mostly got my anger out during my sports after school. After all the bullying, I started becoming
more aggressive in soccer and lacrosse, which made my coaches happy.
The same week, that I had been bullied in school, I had a championship soccer game on
Saturday. The team who we were playing were extra aggressive and I wanted to win. It was dark
and raining out that day. I was drenched in water, dirt, and mud, playing like we were champions.
During the game, I had slid into a girl who was two times my size. She fell, but I stood proud as
a defender who had stopped a goal. I saw the ball rolling in the corner of my eye. The ref hadnt
called a foul, and I ran hard toward the ball. I dribbled hard past one, two, three defenders. I
stomped my foot into the ground and kicked the ball as hard as I could toward the goal. As the
ball flew, time stood still, and my heart pounded, slowly. Sweat dripped down my face as if on a
window. As I kicked the winning shot, the goalie jumped to the wrong side, and as I hit the
ground, the ball hit the net with a swish. The crowd in the stands cheered so loud as my
teammates tackled me into a mud puddle.
I was also getting better about responding to bullying in school without getting all
physical. About two weeks after the accident with Jack, a lot of my friends were starting to be
bully targets. Most of my friends are too shy to stand up for themselves or for each other, so
usually I am the one that has a say in when people are being bullied. My friends are the ones that

help me when I am down and help build me back up, but when they are the ones being put down
I stand up for them as if the bullies had insulted me personally. This girl named Janet started to
bully Desirae, for no reason. Desirae and I were in the same gym class as Janet; we were starting
our dance unit and the three of us were partners. Desirae and I dance for fun together so we had a
lot of routines in mind. Everyday Janet would ignore us and say we are bad at dancing and would
hang out with other people in different groups. I never liked her from the day I met her, but
Desirae was her friend in the beginning of the year. After gym class Desirae was practicing
moves that we learned at dance class yesterday.
Desirae what are you doing? Janet asked
Just dancing, duh.
Thats not dancing. You look like a seal trying to dance.
I had just walked out of the locker room and was getting a drink of water when I heard this. I
couldnt help myself but cut in the conversation.
Janet, you said you dont dance. So, I doubt you understand good dancing when you see it.
Everyone in the gym was watching Janet when I said this.
Oooh, she told you, Janet.
Both Desirae and I walked away to get ready for lunch, both of our hands tied in fists.
Desirae and I can both can stand up for ourselves, most of the time, but we are more alike
than we think. We are different than the other girls, we dont wear heels, we dont wear dresses
and we hate skirts. I played about three sports and I was had more guy friends than girl friends, I
was considered one of the guys. I took gym class as an opportunity to work on my skills as an
athlete, whereas other girls saw it as an opportunity to flirt with the guys and to get their
homework done. As an athlete if you dont have good grades, you dont get to play in games; I

like playing sports, so I tried hard to keep my grades up. I wasnt the best at school, I got
distracted easily. I never liked writing papers, or doing research. I liked math and science, I came
easy to me. My spanish class had two of my friends in it, so my teacher hated me, because I liked
talking to them all the time, and not in spanish. One of my teachers taught both history and
english, I hated these classes, not just because I hated the subjects, I hated the teacher too, her
name was Jennifer Omartian. Even though the teacher and I had more in common than most
people, I did not like her not one bit. The teacher and I both had a house in upstate New York, in
the Catskills mountains. She owned a camp named Camp Nubar, near my lake house further up
the mountain. Throughout the year my friends had grown to hate her more than me, because she
had given unfair grades. My friend Danielle and I both were in the same history class and was
working on a project, and I didnt know the timeline we had and asked Danielle for it, before she
started writing it, I copied the slide show for the time line and started writing on a different
google slide. Mrs. Omartian thought we cheated and I copied her whole project. I tried
explaining what happened, but she didnt believe me at all and Danielle and I had to redo the
whole project. My face was red and I felt like my head was going to explode from all this anger
rising slowly down to my hands making them into fists. Seeing this Danielle pounced on me to
calm me down and walked me down to gym. As we walked down the hall more of our friends
joined us in the hallway. My hands unraveled and I was calming down, I walked into the locker
room to get dressed and saw Desirae getting bullied for the second time.
If you stop now I wont hurt you. Janet and the other bullies laughed. I was so frustrated that I
wasnt thinking and turned away and punched the wall, making a hole. Watching this carefully
the bullies retracted and ran out the locker room. I was breathing hard, my hand was covered in
white dust from the wall. At the loud bang, Mr. D, the security guard, knocked on the door, Is

everything okay, I will get Mrs. Smith. Mrs. Smith came in and looked at me, and saw my hand,
Nora, what did you do? I hesitated for a few seconds and using the same hand I pointed at the
hole, Im sorry, but they were bullying Desirae and I didnt feel like hitting another person this
year. I would get another strike.
Nora, you could have just
Please dont say walked away because I would never, ever, do that.
Okay, when than you could have run and got me, I would have been able to handle it.
Im sorry I know we learned that in health class.
Yes, be assertive, Not passive, and not aggressive. I nodded my head in understanding, but I
knew the only way they were going to stop is if I just let them bully Desirae. They were never
going to stop, thats not how it works, especially with these girls. I was never going to let that
happen, not on my watch, not to anyone else in this school anymore.
Most adults or mainly teachers, try to stop bullying in school, but out of school or on
social media, they cant do anything. I used to go up to people who have been bullying and stand
up to them by force, now I ignore bullies who bully me but stand up for other people being
bullied on. Now, when I get into a fight, I walk away, very anger, but with my hands in tight fists
and try to shake off all the bad vibes.