On my own selfishness.

If you're here, it won't be because of a direct link.

I spoke not too long ago about self-hatred, about how there are aspects of myself that I genuinely loathe.  I've lived a less-than-upstanding life, you see.  I've been weak, been cruel.  I've done things I'm deeply ashamed of, things I've often thought about, but never really talked about at length.

But I started this blog in an attempt to try to get to an honest place.  And to do that, I think I need to state these things in public so I can face them, learn from them, and move on.

So no, I won't be posting links to this post in my usual social media holes.  In part to protect the parties mentioned, but mostly because to be honest, this is more for me than it is for you.

I tortured someone for being better than me.  Growing up, I was always the natural target.  Weird kid with the glasses wearing his brothers' hand-me-downs.  Shitty at sports, skinny, short - I was really easy to pick on.  All I really had going for me was the fact that I was smart.  So I pinned a lot of my pride on that point.  Got through the basketballs to the head and the getting my books knocked out of my hands with a false sense of superiority.  I truly believed that even though I was just an above-average academic performer, I really was the most mentally agile kid in school.

Until, of course, Scott showed up.  He was a year behind me, part of the gifted and talented program like me.  Good kid; soft-spoken and kind.  Awkward in a way that I felt an immediate kinship.  And he was better.  Two years ahead in math to my one.  Consistently tested higher.  He was the first person I can remember who was very clearly more intelligent than I was.

So I bullied the shit out of him.  Used my linguistic skills to constantly deride him, to pound him into the dirt with invective and mockery until he sat sullen and dejected in the back of the short bus.  I used everything in my arsenal to make him feel as small as possible.  Just as the jocks and cool kids beat me down, I did everything in my power to try to break his spirit.  Just because he was brilliant.

I dumped my girlfriend with a roll of toilet paper.  I'd been dating K for a year and change.  I'll never forget the girl; she will always remain burned in my mind as my first true love.  We're still good friends today, despite the miles of shit we put each other through.  We just had to not talk to each other for a year or two before we could get there.

Anyway, one cold winter party, she'd gotten drunk and passed out early.  In the consequent hour, I started getting fresh with another member of our crew, which turned into a surreptitious agreement to head back to her place.  Now, here's where things get extra-scummy.  Before I left, I swiped the closest writing surface I could find (a roll of toilet paper), and wrote a tersely-worded note to K breaking up with her, which I left draped on the floor of our shitty attic room before I trotted off for a sub-par hookup.

While a reprehensible act in and of itself, the weight of this action might not be immediately evident.  See, up until this point, I had never cheated on a girlfriend.  So in order to preserve my perfect record, I just broke up with my girlfriend instead.  Using a roll of toilet paper.  Because somehow, that was the more honorable thing to do.

I betrayed my best friend for my own self-gain.  Band elections were coming up.  For some reason, my best friend and I had decided to both run for president; he was first-chair trumpet, I was first-chair tenor sax.  It seemed like a classic woodwinds vs. brass rivalry.  And, of course, it was as meaningful as being in the Model UN - it was a popularity contest on a ridiculously small scale.

So we made a pact.  For our speeches, we agreed to just stand up at the podium, say "Hi, my name is [blank], vote for me." and be done with it.  He went first, smiled, said his line, and stepped down.  I got up, and I delivered a speech.  I don't know what happened.  Something clicked in my head that I wanted to win this thing, so I just stabbed the one guy who'd stood up for me during my long and pettily painful school years in the back without a second thought.

And he knew it, too.  He only gave it a hurt-sounding "What's the deal, man?" before it was dropped, but it was there.  The joke was on me, anyway; he had the percussion vote in his pocket, and he walked with the win anyway.

This is why I don't trust myself.  Because for one moment, when the stakes were so meaninglessly low, I turned on my most loyal and trusted friend in an attempt at a cheap win.  Because no matter how many years of meaningful conversations and presence there can be between myself and my friends, no matter how deeply rooted someone may be in my heart, I have proven to myself that I can turn on them for nothing.

Realizations like this haunt you.  The guilt sits like stale water in your chest.  I am a bully.  A cheater.  A traitor.  And I am so much more, so much more than I've admitted here.

It is not a good feeling.  And it's all I can do to keep myself from being those things ever again.