Like a baby you're a stubborn child -- what's the matter Always looking for an axe to grind -- what's the matter While you're wondering what the hell to do We were wishing we were lucky like you - Mika, "Blame it on the Girls"
Last night I lost respect for someone that I used to call a friend. It was really sad hearing him admit that he had gotten meaner and hearing him and his friend just talk badly about people. What upsets me the most is I don't think he fully realizes the influence he has on people. I know people who look up to him, and I've heard people say they want to be just like him, which makes it all the more upsetting. Usually things in his chat start pleasant, but the minute he (or his friend) start talking trash, the floodgates open in the chat and people seem to think it's okay to talk poorly about people they don't know.
Criticism has its place, but what they're doing is not criticism. It's putting someone else down to feel better about oneself. They have become the bullies that picked on them in high school (or maybe they're always the bully and just never grew out of it, I don't know). These are grown men, I feel like they should realize that they have so many people who look up to them and why would they take the moral low ground? Is it really that difficult to be nice? It baffles me how easy things can turn ugly, and how nothing is done to stop it and no one seems to care because they're "cool" I guess. It's just frustrating.
I don't think I can go on his chats ever again, simply because it seems like lately everytime I do I just end up getting upset. I want to support him, I want to be a friend, but it's becoming more and more difficult because he seems to enjoy the negativity and I've learned that I thrive on positive energy, and I like being optimistic and seeing the good in everyone. This is not to say that their complaints are invalid; rather, a public forum like a chatroom is not the place to complain. I feel like when you do so, you're just doing it to make yourself feel better, which is not how you should be making yourself feel better. Am I the only one who feels better after being nice to people? Again, is that really hard?
You talk poorly about people behind the back, and then wonder why people are so hostile to you - even if you're only talking behind your back, people can tell, and word always gets around. And I know that he can't control the actions of the people in his chat - some people are just negative and like to talk crap no matter what, but I find that more often than not it usually doesn't happen unless the chat host brings it up first.
Part of me wants to give up on this "friendship" entirely (I've deleted him from skype and gchat), but then I remember 1 Corinthians 13:
4Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
I keeping hoping he'll turn around and be the nice(r) person he used to be; I have a hard time with being patient. But I hope he knows that I will always be here for him, if he ever needs me, and I will try to support him in other ways (I try not to talk poorly about him in public, which is why his identity will remain anonymous although if you know me you'll know who I'm talking about). I like to see the good in people and maybe I'm just being foolish by thinking that deep down inside there's a nice person who just needs time to resurface. It's frustrating but I'm trying my best.
crazy dream: Dorothy & I were somewhere and we had just pulled off a heist or something, we were both wearing white labcoats and running somewhere. I also had another white coat that was supposed to be another disguise as a professor or something, and I put that on. While running down a flight of stairs we hid our faces because there were some people going up the escalator that would recognize us. We get down the flight of stairs and run to a kiosk, where I think we were supposed to pick up/buy plane tickets. For some reason I have a ton of stuff scattered around the two tables on either side of the kiosk and furiously try to stuff everything into my bag. (Dorothy's disappeared at this point) Cut to me sitting at a bar with a mini wine glass half filled with something - I think it's beer, and I'm slowly sipping it. This guy comes up to me and sits next to me and asks me how much I've had to drink. I reply not much. He then tells me that I should turn myself in. I'm kind of nervous knowing that he knows (he was apparently someone I knew prior and I knew it was plausible that he would have figured out I was part of it), and I start crying. I explain to him that it's not that easy, because turning myself in would mean turning Dorothy in as well. He then tells me that if I had thought about it I would have known he was leading me on. We then passionately kiss for a little bit. Then cut to me back to furiously stuffing things into my bag, thinking I need to get back to the hotel room asap so I can stuff all of this stuff into my suitcase. It's at this point that I realize that I don't have my purse. I run back to where I remember having it last - an open-air food court. I'm running towards the back where I think I left it and on the way get sprayed by a fountain, whose bursts are controlled by buttons that patrons of the food court can push and this lady happened to push it right when I was running by, and she shouted an apology while I ran by but I didn't stop to respond. I find my purse next to a soda fountain, but to my horror I discover that it's empty - someone had stolen everything inside. I start freaking out, running around, trying to figure out what to do. I can't get into the hotel room, and I had no idea when my flight was and I couldn't call Dorothy to ask. I'm so panicked, and all the while worried that I might be recognized and caught. Finally I go back to the food court, and thankfully two employees were still there cleaning up and they had merely taken everything out of the purse and put it behind the counter for safekeeping. I immediately grab my phone - my old sony ericcson phone - and listen to a missed call from Dorothy. She had called at 4, saying that I had two options to get down to Newark... since my phone said it was 7:30pm, I figured she was on the plane and had left (esp. since in my dream Newark is a moderate driving distance from wherever we were and Dorothy was saying I had to take a plane), and I started wondering what I was supposed to do... </ dream>
