I’ll be real with you: there are moments where I wake up,
make myself three to five cups of coffee, put on my makeup, and leave my house
in a great mood. To be honest, for the most part I have a generally sunny
disposition. I obviously have my grumpy moments sometimes, as does everyone
else, I’m sure. But usually, my demeanor is a relatively happy medium. I’m
never super up or down. Just a normal, in between of the two.
But sometimes.
Sometimes I just fucking hate everyone.
To be honest, I think a lot of it stems from people taking
total advantage of me. I get really aggravated when my tendency to be too nice
seems to incessantly backfire. I find that my ability to always go out of my
way for other people creates huge problems for me. I give people the shirt off
my back only to stand naked in the street when it turns out that I might need
something. Should I ask for the favor to be returned, all kinds of hell breaks loose.
And I don’t like it.
And people tend to communicate these alleged misgivings via
their Facebook statuses. Okay, A, like I don’t know that you’re talking about
me. And B, what is this? If it doesn’t happen on Facebook, it doesn’t really exist?
Is your life suddenly a reality show slotted to be watched by the likes of
Honey Boo Boo viewers? If you’re trying to break my balls, it worked. Now get
over yourself.
This is probably why I sit at home, watching Mad Men reruns
and getting drunk by myself. Because people are goddamn greedy and terrible.
(And also, a great deal of them? Really bad spellers. Just saying.)
I already explained
this. I don’t like you. True, I don’t like most people, but I especially
dislike you. I could start my own religion based on how much I dislike you. –G.A.
Aiken
But my heart isn’t always as black as night. (Cue the Melody
Gardot song.) I am not by any means a person who is insensitive or
inconsiderate of other people’s feelings. On the contrary, actually. I try too
hard to find the good in people. And sometimes, despite my inner hippie
mentality, the reason I have to try so goddamn hard is because there isn’t any.
As much as I’d like to live my life like it, the world is not revolving around
a Marvin Gaye song. It’s rather unfortunate.
I go out of my way too frequently, get so absorbed in other
individual’s problems that it actually physically affects me, and try way too
hard to make things right. What’s difficult for me is that stuff will really
bother me. I’ll stay up at night worrying that I’ve offended someone or
possibly hurt their feelings. I will develop this legitimate complex that they’re
either angry at me or angry about something that I can possibly fix. I tell
myself that I may have the power to alleviate whatever ails them. Maybe that’s
how I selected my particular career path.
But it can be a problem with my acquaintances and friends because
this stuff troubles me. A lot. And the fact is that other people are not like
me. They’re dreadful, ungrateful, and insensitive. They only care about themselves.
And I fucking hate that. It’s like everyone on this planet is stuck in a gutter
and I’m busy trying to pull them all out.
And what I don’t understand is how this kind of behavior,
this kind of antagonistic, almost combative attitude, could ever be a rewarding
way to live. It boggles me how an individual would ever intentionally act in
such an unsavory, unsatisfactory manner. Because I’ll be real with you, my mom
sometimes drives me absolutely crazy. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I love her.
But she’s got that standard, German, farm fed, Chicago way of nagging the
absolute shit out of me. But honestly, I mean, that’s most moms right?
Listen, I can get loud. It’s not often because I don’t want
to damage my semi-talented vocal chords. My point is when I get even the
slightest bit snippy with my mom, I feel really, really guilty. (That’s the Italian in me, I think. I don’t even
like cursing in front of my mother. Sometimes it just happens.)
But let’s be real: I come from two of the craziest countries
in Europe. I don’t let her know I
feel bad (also the Italian in me), but I do. I really do. Even when I know I’m
right and she’s pushing my buttons, when I feel like I’m totally justified to
be cranky, I hang up and then I feel terrible. I’ll look over at my husband and
say, “Was that mean? I was hard on her, wasn’t I? I should call her back,
right?” And meanwhile, my mom is probably shaking her head, sipping her Merlot,
turning up her Adele, and never giving it a second thought. But I feel terrible. Because I don’t like
being this way. I don’t like raising my voice. I don’t like being intentionally
hurtful. It’s not my style.
I’m not a dictator.
It’s just that I have a grumpy face. –Augusto Pinochet
So I used to have this friend, and I use the phrase “used to”
because I’ve since chosen not to talk to her anymore. (Again, not my style. But
sometimes you’ve gotta do what you’ve gotta do.) Anyway, I’ve done so because
this girl is really loud, harsh, relatively immature, and likely to fly off the
handle for no particular reason. We’re talking Bad Girls Club: Season 1 status.
(Anyone remember the “I run LA!” girl? Jesus, what a train wreck.)
But listen, I tried. I worked really, unfairly hard to maintain
a friendship with this woman because I thought the minimal things we had in common
were worth forging a bond over. She called out to my inner hood rat on some really
warped level. But I was so, so wrong. Turns out, we had virtually nothing in common, former hood rats or
otherwise, and it totally was not worth the effort. Not in the slightest.
I’ve always been very thoughtful, pensive, and sort of stuck
in my own head. (Anyone who knows me knows that I have a very serious staring
problem. This is because while I’m supposed to be working, counting the
register, or learning about Evidence Based Practice, I’m thinking about a
gazillion things. And staring at people seems to help me focus… and also apparently
start a lot of fights in the Starbucks lobby.) But this former friend, on the
contrary, had a habit of throwing her opinion around to anyone within earshot
and she never seemed to care who she offended. She was always picking fights,
habitually getting mad at everyone for virtually everything, claiming she
worked harder than anyone else, and refusing to respect any kind of authority.
But the reality of the situation was, her opinions were extremely closed minded
and forgive me, but full of shit. Her fights never appeared to be justified, she
didn’t work harder than anyone else, unless her job was continually checking
her Facebook, and the reason no one appreciated the minute amount of work she did do was because she was so goddamn
disrespectful that none of the limited good shit seemed to matter.
She was one of those entitled bitches, considering herself
naturally deserving of everything, and lacking any decent form of manners enough
to be appreciative of what she did possess. And despite it all, she deemed
herself worthy of far bigger things. And I’ll be honest with you, that kind of attitude
really got on my nerves. So eventually, despite my guilty conscience about
being “mean” or “cold” to her, I slowly stopped doing things for her.
I stopped driving her places. I stopped paying for her
breakfast. I stopped cooking for her stupid parties that she couldn’t afford to
throw in the first place. And pretty soon, I stopped answering her text messages.
I just sort of stepped back and moved on because I didn’t want people like that
in my life.
Life is hard enough with good people. I don’t need the extra
toxic ones making me all grumpy. I don’t need to be treated like yesterday’s
garbage when I’ve been nothing but thoughtful, done nothing but go out of my
way, and shown nothing but active listening when this ex homegirl needed to
talk. (Which seems like ALWAYS. Just saying.)
And how did she return the favor? Slander me on Facebook and
tell my friends what a shitty person I am. I choose not to address her
personally because ain’t nobody got time for that. I instead decided to write
this blog as a cautionary tale for individuals who are “painfully nice”, as one
of my dearest friends put it.
But what I really
wanted to say to her was: Shitty? Bitch, you DON’T KNOW shitty.
But since I’m a classy broad, I decided to skip it.
Moral of the Crazy: I don’t know why people find it
appropriate to be just generally incorrigible. I don’t know how they can go to
sleep at night being so vicious and unruly. When I’m mean (and we’re talking my
definition of mean) to people, I feel bad about it for a long, long time. Even
when they really goddamn deserve it. Because my thought process is: What if
this person walks out in front of a bus tomorrow or gets killed by a drunk
driver after leaving work, and the last thing I said to them was, “Keep my name
out of your mouth, you ratchet, dirty Jersey bitch!” (Sorrrrry, that’s just my
dad talking.) That’s not the kind of way I want to live. I don’t want to be
that person. Ever. I’d rather just keep it inside and let it fester. Let them
go on being annoying while I pretend that I don’t even know what happened.
Works like a charm.
(For those wondering: My dad used to take the stop sign
route. True story: Guy picks on his sister when they’re leaving a Catholic cotillion
on Long Island. He gets sick of the shit talking and puts the guys face through
a stop sign. Still has the scar on his knuckles. But that’s not me. I’m 5’2”,
not 6’2”.)
Honestly, I just find it easier to be agreeable. Life is
easier when you don’t have foreseeable mistakes looming over you. And
sometimes, when you’re good to people who aren’t certifiable histrionics, it
can be rewarding.
Life is too short to be cold and conniving. I honestly
believe that life is so much smoother, so much safer, and so much happier when
your intentions are genuinely good.
So live everyday like it’s not only your last, but other’s
as well. Because the sun is warm and bright (and is a natural source of Vitamin
D!), there’s liquor stores on every corner (thank God!), and most people have a
lot of good in them.
And those that don’t? Well at least you know that you tried.
I have decided to
stick to love. Hate is too great a burden to bear. –Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
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