Devil at My Heels - Louis Zamperini [3]
I NEVER CONSIDERED myself that different from my friends until I started grade school, where I began to feel painfully self-conscious. Everyone spoke English well but me. Now I can’t speak Italian, but then I got held back a year because I couldn’t understand the teacher. She called my parents and said, “You’ve got to start speaking English at home.”
We did, but only when someone insisted on it. Dad still considered Italian easier because he mispronounced a lot of English words or mixed up their meanings. Like, “Take the sweep and broom the sidewalk.” We knew what he meant, and he knew we knew, so there was no giving him a hard time.
My mother spoke better, and eventually I caught up with my English lessons and forgot most of my Italian, except for a few swear words. But I still had enough of an accent for the kids to pick on me. Though I was born in America, I was made to feel like an outsider. Every recess I was surrounded by jeering, kicking, punching, and rock-throwing kids. The idea was to make me crazy so I’d curse in Italian. “Brutta bestia!” The longer it went on the more my resentment grew.
It didn’t help that I thought I was a homely child with skinny legs, big ears, and a wild mass of black, wiry, hair. I could never get it to comb back and stay. I tried pomade, even olive oil. I’d wet down my hair at night and stuff my head into a nylon or silk stocking with the foot cut off and the end tied. Because I spent so much time trying to get my hair to look like the other guys’, anybody at school who touched it was in trouble. Sometimes I didn’t wait to see who’d done it; I’d just turn and swing. Once I shoved a teacher. Another time I hit a girl with a glancing blow and the warning “You don’t mess up my hair!”
As a result I got beaten up a lot, and I wanted to kill those responsible. I spoke to my dad, and he made me a set of lead weights, got me a punching bag, and taught me to box. After about six months I got even by beating the hell out of those who bullied me. Once I followed a kid who taunted me into the bathroom; after landing a few punches I stuffed paper towels down his throat and left. Fortunately, another kid found him in time. When the principal heard, he sent me home and my dad punished me.
The whole time I was busy getting revenge I desperately wanted to fit in. For instance, I remember a mound of dirt on the school grounds and a big guy who’d get up there and say, “I’m king of the mountain!” I wanted in on that game; I wanted to be king of the hill, but he’d shove me down. One day my mother made an apple pie and gave me some for lunch at school. I gave it to the big guy. Finally he let me up on the hill.
Otherwise, my wish went unanswered. The group never really accepted me, and I had to follow my own path. More and more that became getting into trouble, and the self-esteem I developed from my successes there was the kind that comes from feeling good about getting away with being bad.
The wrong kind.
Take smoking. I had started when I was about five years old. At first it was curiosity; I got a little bit in my lungs and felt dizzy. But soon, walking to school each morning, I’d keep my eyes open for passing cars. If someone tossed a cigarette out the window, I’d run up, grab it, and save the butt until I had some matches.
Eventually the local motorcycle cop caught me. Afterward, whenever he could, he’d be at my house before school to give me a ride so I wouldn’t smoke. When I was older, I’d wander in and out of stores and hotel lobbies with my head down, searching for butts. The long ones I saved for myself; the rest I dumped into a paper sack. Then I’d go to my favorite hiding place on Tree Row