One day in the summer after my freshman year of college, while I was working at the local animal shelter, I was discussing with one of my coworkers how I had discovered I loved pit bulls, of which the shelter had many. We were specifically discussing Jillian, a dog who shared a name with me, but predated me at the shelter by a couple of weeks. (As an aside, I'm pretty sure they knew I was going to be working there before they named Jillian. I'm still not sure how I feel about a socially incompetent and extremely bouncy pit bull that latches onto clothing in order to get attention being named after me.) My coworker said, "Yeah, you and Jillian are a lot alike, I think."
Um. What? Jillian was (is - she went into a pit bull rescue group) a playful dog who had some abandonment issues and ate whatever wildlife was dumb enough to wander into her run. (Really, what possum worth its salt thinks, "Hey, an animal shelter filled with dozens of dogs! I'll just drop in for a visit.") She loves people. I love...some people. She's always ready to play. My energy dies around 2 p.m. She's white and had brown spots. I'm white and have brown hair.
In other words, I had no idea what he was referring to. My face must have registered the fact that I was trying to determine whether our faces were terribly similar and I had never noticed, because he added, "Yeah, once you get your teeth into something, neither of you will just. Let. It. Go."
Oh. Well. Jillian did once almost rip my pants off during a play session - I tried to leave and she just latched onto my pant leg and wouldn't let go. She had a great time, and I spent the rest of the day with the left leg of my jeans dangling from a ripped seam in the back. (At that point, on the pants spectrum, they were bordering on Not-Pants.) And I...well, I've had some things between my mental teeth for quite a while.
So, without further ado, a list, or a progression, if you will, of the grudges I can just. not. let. go.
1) Madame Johnson
My kindergarten teacher. I (and everyone else, really) was always being bullied by Delaney, this giant first grader who'd already been held back and had a history of behavior problems. Once, he grabbed me as I was walking into the coat room, threw me on the floor, and slammed my head into the floor, and then just walked away. And then there was the Incident. I had rushed to be the first in line to go into class, an honor that was very important for Kindergarten Gillian. He cut in front of me. Irritated, (and perhaps suicidal?) I tapped him on the shoulder to tell him that I had been first. He whirled around and punched me in the stomach so hard that I completely lost my breath, and staggered completely out of the line wheezing and generally acting pathetic.
However, this grudge isn't for him. It's for Madame Johnson, who, when informed by a no-doubt hysterical Kindergarten Me that I had been punched, kept Delaney in during recess. I swanned off to go play, sure that I would be vindicated and he would be punished. Horribly. Preferably publicly. Maybe he would get expelled. Turns out, she was asking him for his side of the story. I got back from recess, and was pulled aside, expecting to hear about what was going to happen to Delaney. But Madame Johnson said, "Now, Gillian, Delaney told me about how you shoved him. His reaction was not nice, but you can't just shove people who get in your way. So, you have to apologize to each other, because you both did something wrong."
What. The. Fuck.
I was eventually persuaded to apologize, sobbing with the injustice of it all (I was a very weepy kid). But in the (embarrassingly frequent) reenactments I have done in my mind, I tell her that she is a grossly unfair bitch who should be ashamed of herself. I punch her in the face. I simply refuse to apologize for something I didn't do. In retrospect, I understand why she had to at least try to make Delaney feel like he was being heard - the kid had problems I probably had no concept of, and ended up going to some sort of school that, it was whispered, was for delinquents. But still. I just can't quite let go of this breach of trust.
2) The shoes
When I was 13, my mom went to New York City for a week. My favorite pair of shoes did too. Without me in them.
3) Hayleigh
Ah, best friend break-ups. Hayleigh and I were best friends from when I was 12, in the 8th grade, and she was 14 and in the 9th, until I was 15 and a junior and she was 17 and a senior. For a couple of years, things were great - we talked, we laughed, we wore dark clothing, listened to goth rock and lamented that no one understood us. And then slowly, things changed. Around the beginning of my junior year, she got snarky, taking delight in highlighting my most painful faults. I got defensive, pointing out that I was prettier, smarter, and taller (by 2.5 inches). She went public, telling people that I attacked her over a cookie (look, I like them, but come on) and that I had had a threesome when I was 14 with some friends of ours. I went ballistic in the only way High School Me could, and commenced turning all of our mutual friends against her.
But by about halfway through the year, I just gave up. I avoided her as much as was possible when, in the glory days of our friendship, we had tried to have all of our classes together. I didn't answer the phone when she called. She once commented on a blog post I made, saying, "oh, you're still alive. i wasn't sure since you never answer the phone when i call." In the end, I just wrote in her yearbook when she graduated that I hoped she had a good life, that we had had some good times, and that I would miss our friendship. I'd like to think that this was taking the high road, but really, it was just taking the easy one.
Then came Facebook. I finally got one after starting college, and labored endlessly to avoid friending people I knew she would be friends with. However, I eventually let my guard down and did friend someone I knew she was also friends with, figuring that since it had been a year and a half since we had spoken, she would leave me alone. Alas, I was wrong, and she added me almost immediately. There followed an excruciating set of messages, wherein we discussed in great detail why our friendship died. She told me that she was jealous of me, and was convinced that I had my eye on her Yu-Gi-Oh playing, college drop-out, future ex-husband, who at the time was dating someone else. I told her she was wrong. She asked if we could still be friends. I told her that I wished her all the best, but that I just didn't want to know her anymore. Even after all that time, I couldn't forgive her enough to let her back into my life. (Even after all this time, I still find enjoyment, deep down, in talking about how she did me wrong.)
4) The Theater
The summer before college, I worked at a movie theater. I wore a red vest, a bow tie, extremely unflattering black pants, and an aura of discontent and popcorn. My boss had told me that she would pay me 25 cents above minimum wage. The entire summer, I was paid minimum wage exactly. I complained. A lot. She told me it was a corporate decision, and that she was trying to fix it. I told her that I was going to talk to the Department of Labor. The Department of Labor told me that there was nothing I could do, since I wasn't being paid below minimum wage. My boss told me I would get gift certificates, or posters, to make up for it.
Then money went missing from the cash drawer that I had only worked for part of the day, and I was written up for it. (I did not take it.) My boss hinted that this was not the correct way to make up for lost wages. I hinted that I couldn't wait to go to college and never come near this hell-hole of overpriced concessions and brain-dead managers ever again.
5) Jillian
This one isn't really against Jillian, let me just say, lest you get a bad idea about pit bulls. I love pit bulls. Have I mentioned that yet?
Anyway, back to the animal shelter, the summer after my freshman year in college. I was usually dealing with the cat rooms - cleaning, feeding, and, most importantly, medicating, over a hundred cats and kittens in the height of kitten season. There was an upper respiratory infection sweeping through just about every cat there, so my days were filled with shoving pills down enraged feline throats. However, one cat, who was one of my favorites, had crawled into the outside enclosure, and refused to come back in. He was in bad shape, and needed to be force fed and medicated right away. So, I went around to the outside door to get him. On the way, I stepped on a piece of gravel, which seemed to poke through my ugly, ugly clogs. I grabbed it and tossed into the swamp so no one else would step on it, then grabbed the cat and went on my way.
When I got to the laundry room/kitchen/medicine room, I plunked the cat down and began to mix some wet food and water for him, when I noticed my foot felt awfully wet. The cat wasn't going anywhere, so I took my foot out of my shoe and looked down, only to observe that it was completely filled with blood. The rock had not just gone into my shoe, but into my foot.
Then commenced a series of ridiculous contortions wherein I tried to get my foot into the sink so it would stop dripping blood on the concrete floor (the stains are still there), and then to wash and bandage it. A volunteer happened to come in, saw the blood, and ran to get the manager. In rushed my manager, looking deeply concerned. She saw me, standing with one foot in the sink, and began to laugh. "Oh my God," she said. "When the volunteer told me that Gillian had cut her foot really badly and was bleeding all over the place, I thought she meant Jillian the dog! I was so worried!"
"Thanks," I muttered to the sick cat.
