My Bad Reputation

About one million years ago I stood in the middle of a boozy, smoky loft, the floor littered with bottles and crushed cigarette butts. It was about 4 in the am and I was quite drunk and so were the dozens of other mohawked attendees. This was more or less a routine evening for me at this time in my weird little life, but what stands out about this particular evening was what I overheard. A tattered looking lad was sitting on a tattered looking couch. He leaned in toward his friend (who appeared to have vomit drying on his chin) and said, "She can be so fucking harsh, man. Just so mean."

The "she" in question, was me. It was jarring to hear. I'd always thought of myself as kittenishly soft. Very affable. But, apparently, these two did not.  Why, I thought as I smacked them about their pale faces. Why on earth would they say that?

While icing my fist, I took a good, long, hard look at myself. Perhaps there was something to what they said. Yes, I yelled a lot. Yes, I sometimes stormed out of rooms when people were mid-story because I didn't want to hear the boring end. Yes, I chucked things when I got mad, occasionally leaving someone with a faint scar. (Very faint, you crybabies.) Things were beginning to add up.

As I stumbled home I decided it was probably time to mend my ways, lighten up a little, try out some charm school magic.  Nobody wants to be seen as a meanie,

But here's the thing - no one bothers to tell you how much fucking energy manners take. How time consuming it is to hold a door open, dash off a thank you note, give away your cabs, or smile. These were dark times for me. Just lifting a lit smoke to my lips was absolutely exhausting most mornings.

I spent the better part of a week doing what I could to improve my character before wearily flopping onto my unmade bed and deciding that in a certain light, there was a forceful beauty in a bad reputation.  Maybe not such a bad thing after all.