Things That Might Have Been

They say that you walk past a thousand opportunities a day without ever seeing them...  Usually you hear that in respect to financial pursuits, but I think it applies to many things.

Today a friendship died because the opportunity to understand each other and reach out with love and respect was left unseen.  It just degenerated into name calling, insults and misunderstanding.  That's a sad thing.

I take responsibility for the part I had in that happening.  I was bored and I knew in the back of my mind that this person would react negatively, maybe even purposely misunderstand to justify his reaction, because of the topic and yet I brought it up.  On some level I might have baited him looking for an argument to ease the boredom.  That wasn't my conscious intention, at least not in the beginning, and I'm not especially proud of myself for it but one thing I am is honest.  Quite often brutally honest.

Copied from an unattributed Facebook post

Take up the argument he did!

He came out of the corner throwing punches and told me over and over that I only pretend to understand an issue before I pronounce my opinion as a gospel fact... that what I think about current events is a joke... that I will never understand where he's coming from and therefore have no right to speak...  and that anyone who agrees with my point of view is, basically, a sellout.  Insult after insult was hurled at me.  Until I said I didn't want to be friends any longer because he was being such a hurtful jerk and not contributing anything useful to the conversation.

I still don't know where he stands only that in his mind where I stand is wrong, wrong, wrong and WRONG!

What were we fighting about?

Something you'd think would be easy to agree on... the tragedy a family feels when a child is murdered.  I think that is a horrific thing for every family that has to experience it.  He felt it was a different ballgame if the murderer was not punished the way he saw fit and that those times deserved a stronger outrage from all of society.  And if you didn't react just like him... well, then you just are too dumb to 'get it.'

I'm a little sad it's over but I also think it's the best thing that could happen given the situation.  I don't think it's salvageable and even if it was, being so negative, I'm not going to put in the effort to patch it up.  I'd always be wondering when he'd verbally attack me again.  I don't trust him any longer... and can there be a real friendship without trust?

So I'm choosing to just let it go and move on with loving the people around me better.

And for the record... I still say every child that is killed or molested or otherwise abused is a tragedy.  Not just the ones that meet someone's narrow criteria set, but EVERY CHILD.