I’ve tried to be introspective and quiet and avoid conflict, but for fuck’s sake, SHUT UP! If you are going to gossip about me all around town, it will get back to me, and it did.
Do you feel somehow in the right by talking about me? We’re in this rift because you couldn’t mind your own business. I shared with you, and rather than protect the information shared like the fragile thing it was, you ran to the other side of the issue the very next day…which was the wrong thing to do.
I walked away, thinking that would be a good temporary resolution until I could get a clear perspective and have a calm discussion. No fanfare, no naming of names, I just walked away. No smack talking, no name calling, I just walked away to think.
I’m still not smack talking or name calling or even telling the world your name, as tempting as it might be when I’m so dismayed and frustrated in this moment. You’ve been talking about me BY NAME around town, and it made its way back to me. You’ve been super specific, sharing my business with people who shouldn’t know it at all.
So, hear this: I am a good person, and I have done no willful harm. I shared with you when I didn’t have to (I did NOT have to, really, and maybe I shouldn’t have), but I thought it was the right and proper thing to do…and you scampered right on over to the other side with that info the very next day.
I didn’t choose between you and someone else: I chose not to be gossip fodder…ha ha, the big joke’s on me, I guess, because rather than shut it down, you’re talking about me to whoever will listen now like I did something scandalous and obscene.
I naively believed that walking away to spend some time thinking would shut down the gossip train, but it only fueled it. I’m disappointed. I’m naive, thinking that if I extended respectful silence while I was reflecting, I would get respectful silence in return.
For anyone who reads this and can’t follow along: good. I’m not naming names. I’ll only disclose my disappointment, but no names, no details. This feeling of disappointment is mine to broadcast, and the details are nobody else’s business.