Frayed Edges

"I'm sorry you've been through so much.  I really am.  But this is the wrong answer.  It's possible to be in pain without hating yourself and the whole world.  You don't have the right to make everybody else feel the same way you do."  -Thomas Covenant

That quote is one of the reasons I love the Thomas Covenant series so much...  it talks to me.  I'm a very negative person, and I know that.  I've never claimed to be otherwise, and it's honestly just a part of who I am.  When things happen to me...  things like the situation that I find myself in right now...  it makes me even worse.  I hate.  My one aspect hates almost anyone and everyone around me, including myself.  Granted, I don't hate my friends or family, but everyone else is fair game.

The stress is getting to me.  My edges have been fraying at work, and I'm simply worn thin.  My productivity and even my thinking skills have gown downhill, and I'm way too quick to anger.  It also hasn't helped that an old friend has returned to town and to work, and I have mixed emotions there.  Though I hate him with every bone in my body, I have no good reason for doing so, which in turn makes me loathe myself.  I've had people tell me that they've noticed a change in me, which means that I'm not doing a good enough job of keeping up my facade.  I have to try harder.

The hardest thing for me to do will be to not hate... her.  I'm not sure if I can accomplish that.  But no matter what happens, I absolutely cannot teach my son to hate.  I want my son to grow up to be a better person than I, but he'll have a big enough handicap thanks to his white trash Mom.  I have to offset that.  I have to overcome my own emotions well enough to show my son that there are good things in the world.  I rarely see them, and maybe I just don't look hard enough.  During my golden age with the love of my life, I saw good things all around me.  I wrote beautiful, eloquent poetry, I saw a bright future...  my catch phrase was that we were walking "towards an endless tomorrow."  Honestly, I wish my tomorrows had already ended, but I accept responsibility for my failure in that era of life.  Since my golden age ended, I've lost the spark, and I don't see that coming back.

But for my son...  I have to try something.  Maybe he will be the answer for me, a way to help me stop being an angry, bitter asshole.  Or I might fail him like I've failed everyone else in my life.  Flip a coin.