I totally agree Anita. You have analyzed and related the two situations very well. Though nowadays I don’t care that much about possessions but it’s true that a person whom I love so much being “tainted” by someone through harsh words, intentional or perceived, elicits that violent reaction from me. It happened when my favourite actor was being targeted by haters, when Jerry said something about my parents (which I perceived wrongly) and when my mom targeted her wrongly. Funny thing is, after finding me depressed, my parents took me aside saying, “We’re your friends and not just parents. Don’t hesitate to share your feelings.” And then this happens. I don’t feel she could understand even 0.1% of my feelings if she truly considered me a friend.

Yes, my grandma always used to do this as well. There was an incident back in 5th standard or so, when I had found a rare foreign coin lying on the ground in school… and later when it was found out to be belong to one of my classmates, I did not want to give it back but had to after he told the teacher. When I was upset about this at home, my grandma says – “They’ll bury him one day with that useless coin. We’ll give you whatever you want, now just forget that.” OK, at that time I was just an ignorant kid and if the same had happened now, I’d have given the item back as soon as I found it. But I just wanted to show here that I was always treated as someone very delicate and innocent who is targeted by the big, bad world and therefore needs to be protected. And going by my mom’s words recently, it’s not changed at all. They don’t want me to take responsibility for my actions. They’re so obsessed with my studies that they can see nothing else. I know they have good reason to, because the exam I’ll be taking is a very crucial one for my career, but still I do feel values and personality are equally important, if not more.

This same thing happened with my other good friend who had been insecure of my love for Jerry. After the argument when I had been speaking really badly of Jerry to her, after the latter’s apology, I felt really guilty and expressed my guilt to the other friend. She initially kept saying, “It’s not your fault, you were just angry, you are a very good person with great values.” It was only after another friend frankly told me the truth – that I’m a vicious beast for having treated Jerry that way – and I told her that I’m glad he was honest to me, that she finally confessed that even she was disgusted by my behaviour and has no more to say. I just hate it when people do this, trying to defend my actions and calling me innocent just so I don’t feel bad, when my conscience knows the truth. As long as I don’t accept the truth that I no longer am a good person and have become a foul and deplorable individual, I cannot successfully change myself and prevent such incidents from happening again.

Thanks again for being here. Truly means a lot to me.