I knew a guy who built a secret world with someone who was very dear to him.
The man said it changed his life and described it as being something that couldn’t be described or understood by those who had never experienced it.
We said try and he just smiled and said truth is stranger than fiction.
When we asked what happened to it he said one day the queen had left the castle and disappeared. For a while the king hung out because he was certain that she would return.
But when she didn’t he went looking for her.
It took months for him to find her and when he finally did she told him she never wanted to return to the castle. He asked her why and never did get a real answer.
The king told her he didn’t believe she didn’t love him and that she didn’t want to return. It broke his heart to hear this but he figured if it was meant to be it would find its way and if it didn’t, well it wouldn’t.
Upon his return to the castle he discovered that a thief had broken in.
As best as he could tell the thief hadn’t stolen anything but he had spent quite a bit of time reading the love letters the king and queen had written each other.
Initially the king didn’t care and then he discovered the thief was a friend of the queen and he was enraged because he couldn’t imagine how the thief could have found the letters location without having been told where to look by the queen.
He wrote a letter to express his disgust.
“P.R., I am furious with you. How could you have shared these letters with him.”
Five minutes into the letter he took a deep breath and wondered if it was possible the thief had found them on his own.
Your Truth, My Truth & Our Truth
My almost 17 year-old son and I went to war today.
Ok, it wasn’t literal war but it was a good old fashioned battle between father and son. We yelled at each other and stormed around house.
Alright, I’ll be honest and say I yelled more than he did and that it is possible I might have channeled my father’s voice and used his exact words.
Hell, I might have scared myself into a moment of silence because it freaked me out to hear me say the words I swore I never would and to see my son say what I say 35 years or so ago.
In the midst of the kerfuffle I made a point to use the time honored parent’s blessing of “I hope you have a child who does/says the same thing one day.”
My son told me not to hold my breath and I said “when you apologize because your kid is a jerk I will tell you “I told you so” for the next 20 years just because I can.”
*****
Truth isn’t supposed to be malleable. It is not supposed to be something we can bend and shape as needed but life isn’t always black and white.
However it is not ruled by shades of gray either and it troubles me to see us living in a time in which our government spends so much time trying to convince us that up is down and black is white.
It troubles me to see the fractures and fissures in society that create a moment when we truly are living your truth, my truth and our truth.
Because the reality is we are all passengers on the same ship/plane/car and what happens to one is likely to impact all.
*****
I often remind my children that we leave digital footprints all over the place and to be cognizant of that.
Sometimes I show them the information on my statcounter and point out how it presents the names and locations of some visitors.
They have seen attorneys from Bedford, IP addresses from school districts in North Dakota and all sorts of other crazy names and information show up there.
I have pointed out that when the same IP address shows up over and over on every blog I write upon I notice, especially when it is unusual. It is kind of fun to see how comes and to wonder what these stalkers want.
Sometimes I make up stories to explain their presence and sometimes I just ignore them. But if they come visit enough, well I wonder if they are there to make me rich or if there is something else happening.
Good Old Sherman
During the midst of the debate with my teenage son I quoted Sherman and said, “you know I am relatively slow to anger but if you bring this out of me I will give you all you can handle.”
That is a pretty good rule of thumb for working with me.
If you are nice I am probably going to be nice too and even if you are mean I’ll probably be nice.
Not because I am weak, but because angry people get nuts when the people they’re fighting with refuse to get mean.
Kill ’em with kindness works and it generally prevents you from getting into more trouble.
But there are those who have figured out how to press my buttons and if they don’t stop I eventually reach my “burn down Atlanta” stage.
And if you really want to see what happens do something that threatens my family/people I love and watch.
Did The Queen Ever Come Back?
Years passed but the queen didn’t come back.
But the thief did…multiple times.
The king had been hurt and surprised by the first visit but he wasn’t by the visits that followed. His anger was replaced by curiosity and he wondered if the queen had provided the thief with information on how to find the letters.
Eventually he asked a trusted advisor for their opinion and was told to send the queen a letter.
“You ought to let her know that her friend is violating her privacy and her trust by reading the words she shared with you. She might want to know and if you want to protect her you ought to inform her. You don’t know what the thief will do with that information.”
The king nodded his head and said he would consider the wise counsel.
“I will think about it.”
If I was the king in the story that Einstein quote would come to mind and I’d wonder if it made sense to pass along the story because I didn’t know if the queen had told the thief where to go.
That might avoid some heartache and being made to look stupid. On the other hand, if the queen hadn’t, well she might want to know why the thief was looking through her papers.
She could confront him then and get a good game of my truth, your truth and our truth in and wouldn’t that be dandy.
