Aging sure is a weird thing! I was thinking about a particular event that I remember as if it happened yesterday and realized that it happened much closer to 30 years ago than 20. When did I become the person things happened to 30 years ago? In any case, it was a minor thing only memorable because I walked past two of my very best friends that year without saying a word because I was in a snit. I happened to be 14 at the time so it was a good snit. In any case, some poor innocent (the other good friend) was sent as a messenger who caught up with me late that day.
The poor messenger asked me (in his own words) if something had been wrong that day because I hadn't spoken to a certain someone. I probably sounded a bit sarcastic but it was out of legitimate surprise when I expressed my surprise that she had noticed. He put about a paragraph of emphasis into three words, "Yeah. She noticed."
Since the entire snit had been over feeling invisible, my bit of self righteous anger collapsed in on itself. I assured my poor messenger friend that I'd been upset about something but not anymore. Before you think that this is me being self congratulatory, I assure you that I was quite upset that I had inflicted whatever tiny amount of damage that I'd done. My intention was to avoid being my usual self and I found it easy to see myself as a boot licking puppy in those days. Yes, I was - and I am - a few years younger but that did not make me a subordinate just for being nice to someone.
I bring this up because it happened to me again within the last couple of days but in a much lower pressure situation. I saw a picture of someone I'd known online for something like a decade and I complimented her as had many others. That's when the figurative voice in the back of my head told me that I wrote something that made me appear to be some drooling teenage pervert so I added a weak joke on the end. Feeling slightly better, I decided to post the comment instead of deleting it all as I had considered. A back and forth insued and I felt like a complete fool but it ended with her replying that she would have simply believed that the other person would accept a simple compliment but that it might not have been my experience. Ding ding ding! And the winner gets this back handed apology. Is it a left handed apology that I mean? One is actually something nasty disguised as an apology but I mean the one where the apology is real but all covered in a disguise of humor.
Let's skip back to a time so long ago that it was only about a year before I met Melissa as Melissa. I was in a big argument with my girlfriend at the time and she was one who liked to defend herself by appearing all cold and impossible to affect. In fact, I made frequent remarks that I kept in the privacy of my own head that I would rather be with someone like Melissa. (That last part was self congratulatory, of course.) I lobbed insult after insult over the apparently unaffected castle walls to no apparent effect. This all took place online in the Internet's younger days so I was unsurprised when she lost her connection. I took the opportunity to disappear as well before she could return and continue to kick my butt.
Now I'm confused. I think this argument might have taken place after the breakup and after Melissa and I had gotten together. That would make it actually 20 years ago. The ex and I tried to be friends a few times but we kept on running into the same problem. I would hurt her feelings, she would pretend like I was nothing more than a two year old and so I would try harder. Unfortunately, as she confessed to me during one of those times of friendship, I was hurting her feelings and she was just hiding it to try and deny me satisfaction.
The moral of this story is that 2+2=4 no matter how much it looks like 17. If you are being nice to someone, chances are that they do not resent it and think of you as an annoying puppy who won't go away. If you say something hurtful, the target of the insult will probably be hurt. You are probably telling yourself that you're of above average intelligence so you don't need to hear this but I'm of above average intelligence and I could have used the advice within the last couple of days.
I know the impulse that makes you think that you should lash out and I know it well. There have been many years of my life when I've felt invisible to everything but trouble. Trouble can find anyone at any time. I need to work on not being the trouble. The woman who inspired these last few entries is three years older than I am with more kids than I can imagine having. It is far more important from an objective perspective that she spends her attention on those children and her current life than on someone who thought that she was a hero 30 years ago. The ex and I were never serious and we weren't particularly well matched. Then again, we were each other's best option for a brief time more than 20 years ago and I have some fond memories. I'm quite sorry that our very last conversation involved her hitting me with a legitimate complaint that I didn't understand because I confused it with something else. Much later, I had a real metaphorical head slapping moment when I realized that I should have apologized because I had done what she said I'd done though inadvertantly. As for the person I might have insulted in the last couple of days, I think that was the first time I actually saw a picture of her. The picture was pretty and that's a simple objective fact.
Finally, I need to stop thinking of all the bad things I've done in my life now that I'm almost 41. I'm entering my fifth decade of accumulating mistakes and misdeeds. While I do need to learn from them, I must remember the Chiarian motto and "Be gentle with myself."
Today was supposed to be about active listening so I suppose that's next. I think I need to study up or something.
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