poster child of the human condition

I've been thinking a lot about how intertwined my interactions with people have gotten... I've tended to be pretty pessimistic about human nature of late... and to some extent I'd been pessimistic about human nature my whole life. I figured that people were neither good nor evil... just neutral, but they do a lot of nasty things to each other: in fact if there were demons I'd say some humans should be at the top of the list. The fact that they do the bulk of their negative works unintentionally... that its the lies we tell ourselves that are the most pernicious... to me that made it worse and not better. Ignorance was just another point against us...

And so I find myself looking for the exceptions to the rules in my interactions with people... My friends are all very unique people who are difficult to get together for parties: either they would have nothing to talk about or Colin would tell another joke that makes everyone leave...The people I collect have nothing in common except for the fact that they have nothing in common, and they probably don't think the war is great or that we should invest in aerosol powered hummers. My closest friends were all people who I decided quite early were inexplicably unique: usually within a few minutes of meeting them for the first time I decide they are worth a bullet... a definite exception to the rule.

I've come to the conclusion their aren't any exceptions. We are all hurtful... we are all fuck-ups. Some are worse than others... or perhaps some disguise it better than others. And everyone else is looking around the world too, just a little leery... just as casual to trust. We just define trust a little differently, set the boundaries just a few paces off.

I've decided people aren't worth hating... Nothing is worth a grudge anymore. I can see the best in them yet not be disappointed by my interactions either... somehow. I'm not sure how this works, but I know that's how I feel.

There's been a couple of catalysts for that recently... one is my friend Tali... who tends to complicate as well as hold together a subsection of friends to which I hold another part... interconnected in a web of friends and enemies that runs something like an obstacle course.... people hate, are in love with and are actively avoiding eachother... sometimes a couple of these things at the same time. Some of the obstacles are pretty damn retarded... words taken to far, misunderstandings... I can't take down a lot of them, but I did decide to take down my own.

I forgave Mark sometime last week... I finally told him that in so many words... I have a lot more understanding for him than I used to... There's still a lot I don't understand... But I think if I didn't let him know that I have no regrets and no remaining bitterness... he'd beat himself up a lot longer than I would in the long run.
Something wise my friend Jesse said recently:

"most things meet in the middle anyways...
blame, fault, guilt, innocence are all relatives"

So yes... there's more example around these lines... but I'll save that for another day.