Creating a Comfort Zone

By the author, Jim Doti


I think it’s time to change the scenery and move the action away from the school.  I do that by first describing a scene that reconnects Jimmy with his mom and Blackie outside of the school.  There, his mom directly observes the kind of abusiveness he receives from other children.  I also make a point of showing in the last sentence that Jimmy tends to hide his hurt feelings from his mom. 

The first thing Jimmy sees as he walks out the school’s large doors is his mom and Blackie waiting for him.  When Blackie spots Jimmy, his tail starts whipping back and forth.

As Jimmy gets closer, his mom lets go of Blackie’s leash and the little dog runs to greet him.  

Jimmy picks Blackie up. “Hey, Boy, did you miss me?”

Blackie covers Jimmy’s face with wet doggy kisses.  

“I missed you too, Blackie,” Jimmy says.

Jimmy’s mom hugs him and takes out of her purse a chocolate chip cookie still warm from the oven.

Doggy smootches and chocolate chip cookies help take Jimmy’s mind off his newest worry about being cast as an elf in the student play.  But he is rudely reminded of it just a moment later, when Johnny runs by him and shouts, “You’re going to ruin our play!” Then he turns around and laughs at Jimmy.

“What was that all about?” asks Jimmy’s mom.

Jimmy doesn’t answer.  All he can do is turn his head down so his mom can’t see the tears burning in his eyes.

Later, at home, I show Jimmy opening up a bit about his hurt feelings to his mom.  I use her hat-making room as the backdrop for the scene.  Notice that I try to subtly portray a setting that suggests his home, and particularly the hat-making room, is a comfort zone for Jimmy.  As a result, the setting helps him feel more at ease about opening himself up to his mom.

When kids are bullied, I think they feel not only bad, but also are embarrassed.  I need the “comfort” of his mom’s hat room to make Jimmy’s willingness to share his worries with his mom seem more believable. 

At home later that evening, Jimmy walks into his mom’s hat room, where she turns plain hats into beautiful hats by adding decorations, like ribbons, flowers, veils and feathers.  She then sells them to a hat shop near their house.  Jimmy always feels proud when he sees one of their neighbors walking down the street wearing one of his mom’s hats. 

Jimmy likes watching his mom decorate the hats.  He feels safe in her hat room.  He can almost forget about kids laughing at him and making him feel different and dumb.

Suddenly, his mom asks, “Are you ready now to talk about what’s troubling you?”

After a long pause, Jimmy answers, “Mrs. Lyon wamps me to be an elf in a school play.”

“Why, that’s wonderful, Jimmy!” his mom says excitedly.  “You will get to be on stage and be an actor.”

“But all the kids think I’ll mess up the worbs and woom the play.”

“Mrs. Lyons doesn’t think you’ll ruin it.  She has confidence in you, otherwise she wouldn’t have picked you.  If you do your best, you’ll do just fine.  The little mistakes aren’t important.  Now tell me what the play is all about.”

As Jimmy tells his mom the story of “The Elves and the Shoemaker,” Blackie is curled up in his bed listening to every word.

My mom, in fact, was a milliner (hat maker).  And while she did most of her hat making at a nearby shop named “Hats by Sue,” she also brought some work home with her.

To give Lisa an idea of the setting, I am sending her my latest stick figure drawing.