Taking Sides

When a friend of mine recently tripped and fell headfirst into a hole he had dug for himself, I was unpleasantly surprised at the number of people who threw dirt instead of lowering a rope.  They may not have cast the first stone, but they wasted no time in firing back.

When it comes to words, we are the most fragile of creatures.  We hold onto the hurtful things people throw as if they were gold and share them as if they were immutable wisdom.  We recruit others with them, pass them along to gain allies, inflict them and then sit back and say See, I told you so.  And in this rush to take sides and assign blame, we end up at the edge of the hole ourselves.  It makes me think of a playground fight complete with name calling and bloody noses and spontaneous cruelty - by the time it's over, it isn't about what it was about anymore - it becomes a matter of who won or lost and who could yell the loudest and punch the hardest.  Why on earth do we so often choose right over happy?  Right has its own self righteous charm, I suppose, a fleeting sense of vindication or self satisfaction, but happy is healthier, longer lasting and easier on the nerves.

Sometimes taking sides is necessary, even essential, but it's worth remembering that what you do to someone else today, might very well be done to you tomorrow.  Who will defend you?  And who will simply add fuel to the fire?
   
It's easy to judge others behind their back, to desert them when their need is the most desperate and claim self defense.

It's hard to stay a course when you're under attack.

But wars have started with less so if you're filled with fire, just remember that fire spreads and will burn everything in its path.  It won't care who threw the first stone or who was right.  It'll just burn it all down.  So here's a lesson:


Now and again I get distracted at mealtime and turn my back on the dogs.  This inevitably leads to a nasty confrontation and I'm forced to haul one dog ( always the Schipperke) off one of the smaller ones.  She's very serious about food and gives no quarter if she thinks she's being cheated - having an aggressive nature to begin with, she requires special handling and it's wise to approach her with caution - but these food disputes are deadly serious and sometimes it takes great force.  This time when she pinned the little daschund down with much snarling and bared teeth, I was nearby and able to grab her collar and yank her away.  She spun around and attempted to sink her teeth into my wrist but I anticipated her and counter attacked with a twist and shout movement that sent her spiraling across the kitchen floor.

Now, if I'd been the little daschund (shaken but not harmed), I'd have given her a little space and a little time to calm down.  I'd have been angry and resentful and sulky.  I might even have made a scene and said something nasty and spiteful.  Instead, he dusted himself off and trotted right over to her, tail wagging a mile a minute, his small body confident and forgiving.  It took him all of ten seconds or so to forget that she'd gone for his throat and tried to make a meal of him - all of fifteen for her to forget my intervention.

In their nothing personal world, you turn the other cheek and move on down the line.

In mine, you write about it on Facebook.

In their world, they're sleeping side by side in a matter of minutes.

In mine, you're not even speaking.

In their world, forgive and forget comes naturally.  Small wonder I usually prefer their world to mine.