"To be yourself is all that you can do"

It's an unrealistic expectation that we have as humans that others will be or become what we want them to be.

I could get all depressing on you and talk about relationships but I'm not going to. I want to talk about random acquaintances, or maybe even strangers.

Has anyone ever tried to tell you that the tattooed punk who's only friends with stoners is actually completely straightedge? "I know his eyes are always bloodshot, but it's just because he's crying over all the injustice in society."

Or the complete jerk who works in the cafeteria, believe it or not, sends his entire paycheck to overseas orphanages.

People love a good irony. Sometimes to the extent that I think they create the irony themselves.

I'm more than suspicious when you try to get me to believe something that goes against all evidence and reason.

Like when someone tries to tell me, "No no, they're actually SUCH a nice person when you get to know them."

Look...an actual nice person would be nice to anyone, even if they didn't know them. Is that not what being nice means? If someone is a dick to everyone except for the people who are useful to them...that's not nice.

Just because it would wrap up into a neat little story does not mean that the crappy person you work with is actually a saint behind closed, locked and soldered doors.

What I'm about to say may sound a little serious, but just know that ultimately I'm saying that people should be who they are, and true to what they feel. So bear with me.

There can be such things as mean people. And we don't always have to give them excuses. For every person who acts like a complete ass because their parents divorced when they were 11 are 10 more people who aren't an ass because their parents divorced when they were 11.

You may have a million reasons as to why you are the way you are...but that doesn't mean that you aren't really what you are. Follow?

Someone may have what they think is a perfectly good reason to treat people like crap. That's fine. But they shouldn't get to call themselves "a nice person who was dealt a bad hand." In reality, they still treat people like crap. And that's not nice.

Find another adjective people!

We are who we are, and it is very difficult to be any other way...regardless of how lovely the story would be if we could be a different version of ourselves.

Not everyone has to be nice, not everyone has to be straightedge, not everyone has to give their entire paycheck to charity. The world would be boring and kind of creepy if everyone were nice, or endlessly giving.

By all means, every day you should try to be the best person you can be. I can't and won't fault you for that. But I still may not call you nice.


"I am what I am, you could like it or love it"
-50 Cent
...This post needed a little light-hearted pick-me-up from Fiddy.