From: glen@pandora.sdsu.edu (Glen)
Subject: Re: Hunt them down...    
Organization: San Diego State University, College of Sciences
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL5
Date: Fri, 2 Oct 1992 16:42:17 GMT

Stephen Dennison (afdenis@lims02.lerc.nasa.gov) wrote:
: Glen.... while others might find your comments caustic, I think you show a 
: lot of restraint. 

Actually, nobody has flamed me for them yet.  A lot of people have agreed.
Thanks for your reply, also.
 
: Very `Zen' of you, Glen. Revenge serves no one. Still, wouldn't it be fun to 
: take that piece of raw bleeding tissue that *once* was your heart out and 
: force that other person to look at it ... 
: to see their own handiwork... 
: .. just once ? 
: Not revenge, just make them realize what they are doing so they can modify 
: their behavior and perhaps stop lying to others (and, no doubt, themselves) 
: about their wants and needs and, in that process, manufacture pain for both 
: parties. 

I used to think like that... which isn't to say that your way of thinking
is less mature than mine... it's just to say that, each time I had gone
through a breakup, it hurt a bit, and I wanted to do just that.  But, in
this case, my entire life had changed, and been centered around this
person.  When it ended, my feelings changed.  And I learned a bit more about
people.  In this case, no, it wouldn't be fun at all.  I don't want to 
even think about her any more.  It's all just empty.
 
: >It's taken me a while to come back to the land of the living.  The whole
: >incident with this woman caused be to dump on my friends - in some cases
: Accept your own complicity in the deception, though. You had a hand in 
: losing your friends ... you didn't need to ... it wasn't healthy to ...
: it *should* have been (and probably *will* be in future relationships) a 
: red flag that the relationship was *really* unhealthy. 
: You helped to foster the fantasy ... that it didn't come to fruition is sad, 
: but the other person is (generically now) not alone in the blame or 
: responsibility.

No, and it was not really my intention to place all the blame on her.  I
am well aware that in trying to find a balance between what I wanted and
what she wanted, I caused a lot of stress.  But I do blame her for not
being honest - either with me or herself - about her feelings, and especially
for not coming forward with them when she first realised there was a problem,
instead waiting for six months and pretending.  Maybe, at the beginning,
things could have been recovered.  But she let it sit, and grow, to the
point where she didn't want to work on it - she just wanted out.

Not that I'm not familiar with that feeling.  I used to have a strong escape
compulsion that took me a long time to discover and correct.  But, I had
made the decision to move out there, and stay out there, good or bad,
working towards a common relationship.  I never said it would be immediate,
I just said I'd stay and work it out.  She said the same thing.

The difference:  SHE ended it.
 
: >		And maybe you were thinking
: >		  that you thought you knew me well,
: >		But no one ever knows the heart
: >		  of anyone else...
: Amen. Often, though, we *know* another's heart but consciously choose to 
: ignore that knowledge as it conflicts with the reality we want to create.

Even in those cases, I think that knowledge is flawed or limited.  The
thought behind that song (written by Nancy Griffith) was that no one
ever knows ALL the heart - or the most INSIDE heart - of anyone else.  I
agree that there are a few exceptions.  But in most cases, we don't KNOW,
we just ASSUME.  Or, we receive bad information because we or the other
person are not being honest with themselves/each other.  And we therefore
may think we know, but we don't REALLY know.

And in any case, getting to really know the HEART of someone else takes a
very long time and a concerted, ongoing effort.  HA - How different I sound
now from two years ago when I was telling her that a relationship should be
magical and wouldn't require that negatively connoted WORK.

If anyone out there is looking for magic, believe me:  You CAN find it.

But you're going to have to WORK to make it strong and lasting.
 
: >Bitterness?   Try emptiness.   Try having it inflicted on you.
: >Try not to inflict it on anyone else.
: Isn't that the aim of *every* civilized being ? It *should* be.

I agree.  Still, most people just don't get that simple piece of life-
critical information.