Categories: uncategorized
Date: 27 May 2009 14:31:13
I felt isolated. I was in a room full of people that I would term my friends, although to be precise I should say I'm using that term in its broadest sense, and I do mean broad and not just extreme. For in that room were one or two who I would count among the closest friends I've ever had, and some who I would be polite to, but would cross the road to avoid if I could do that without seeming rude. (I seem to have no problem being rude, but am pained by being perceived as such. What vanity!) The point is that physically I wasn't isolated, but intellectually I was, in that I found myself defending a view point which was not only not shared by the others in the room, but was being hostilely attacked by them. I don't like conflict, and I don't like argument. The reality of that dawned on me some ten or so years ago when I was in the presence of someone who clearly thrived on argument and whose every sentence was aimed at stoking up disagreements. While he seemed quite personable I realized that I'd spent the whole time I was in his presence feeling on edge and more and more uncomfortable. So I know I don't like arguments, and as such I will try to find points of agreement where possible, or change the topic to something less contentious where this is not possible. Which works fine until something I view as not contentious, and something on which I expect widespread agreement, turns out to be otherwise. And so it was that evening that I advanced what I thought would be a commonly held view and generally accepted common ground, so as to avoid an argument developing, and to calm things down, and I got torn apart. I suppose, to use a military analogy, it's natural when on common ground to expect to be fired at from all sides, but I wasn't thinking that way. That night screwed me up royally, and left me unable to face any of my friends or anyone else for some time. Perhaps it's also one of the reasons I haven't blogged much lately. But was it that I was being disagreed with, or was it that what I expected wasn't so? And is the problem the fact that I was mistaken, or the fact that that mistakenness disturbed me so much. In fact, did that night matter at all, or did it just reveal what was already badly wrong? Those are the questions I still can't resolve.