Roses are red

They often say that people who were abused as children are more likely to become abusers themselves, unconsciously repeating what they experienced themselves. It's human nature, I suppose. When people feel hurt, they want revenge. Sometimes it's impossible to revenge those who wronged them, so they go on to hurt other people. And the cycle continues. I think it's the same with wars, revolutions, any kind of violence, whether that be physical or emotional. It happens every day on a much smaller scale. We have probably all experienced it to some extent. It's usually obvious when someone doesn't trust others to a pathological extent, it's likely that they'd been hurt badly before and it's likely that they will continue the cycle of hurting others.

It's never happened to me in such a clear and obvious way before. At first I actually didn't want to write about it because I didn't even think it was worth putting into words. Maybe it's not. Maybe it's just more waste of my time. But then I had some conversations with a couple of people today that made me think about it more again. The story goes, as usual, girl meets boy, they seem to like each other, they go on dates, try to get to know each other. When things seem to be getting a bit more intimate, boy disappears. Without a word. Not so unusual as I found out from talking to many girlfriends. Ironically, some men seem to have no balls. No spine. They are little crybabies at the first sign of a difficult conversation, run fast and run far. Which is all well, but the problem is, women tend to look inside for any possible reasons. "What did I do? What did I say?" It takes some strength to believe that it had nothing to do with me.

Months go by and it just comes up in a conversation with a mutual friend. He thinks it's time to share the story. No offense to this particular friend, who I know will be reading this, but really, you had to let me wonder for all these months? Did you believe for a moment that he would be the grownup to explain? But in any case, after 6 months, the big mystery was finally revealed. Without going into too much detail, he had been hurt by a previous girlfriend badly enough that he will probably never trust another woman ever again. With that being said, I don't think that gives him the right or the privilege to act the way he acted. We all get hurt at some point or another by people, whether that be romantic, friendship, family, or otherwise. But we don't have to go on acting like the whole world is out to hurt us because of that. I think that people who have any ability to look at the world from others' perspectives at least occasionally, who have any self-criticism, would be able to see the pattern here.

Ok, enough of that.

On a different note, last night I saw the man of my dreams on the subway. Dark, dreamy, with kind eyes and a great smile and awesome shoes. Reading the Times. And it also happened to be the only night ever that I was carrying a bunch of reddish roses with me (not from a man). When he complemented the flowers, I really just wanted to say that they were from a friend, instead, all I could think of was "they also smell very nice" and then somehow the opportunity was gone. I could only hope that he would get off at my stop, but he didn't and what are the chances that he might read the "Missed connections" section of Craigslist?? None.