Out of the Past

Thanks to the magic of Facebook, I discovered that two of my friends from elementary school were "friends" with someone who constantly teased me. I told them about it. One of them wrote to her "you were one of the kids that tortured her in school, so not cool."

This person's response:

Nope, you are right about it not being so cool. It taught many of us a good lesson to stop bullying. . . . She was always way brighter than most of us and did her own thing. Doing your own thing was something that took many of us years later to realize that it was okay.

On the one hand, I wonder exactly when "we" learned this lesson, because they certainly didn't stop teasing me the whole time I went to school there.

On the other hand, who taught these kids that "doing your own thing" was not okay?  They did all of us a disservice.  I'm angry about that.