Me, Me, Me, Me Don't Like Mean

I had a conversation recently with my gf's mother about mean people.

She is a newlywed and when I say you can see that she is in a wonderful place, I absolutely know it. You can tell that she is in love and she wears it well.

Although her days of going to school are over, she has a schoolgirl giggle. She has an I'm-In-Love-Glow about her. She's always had a positive outlook on life but she embodies this positivity even more now.

Her phone rang and she says, "This is my wonderful husband."

She answers and tells him, "I was just talking about my wonderful husband."

The conversation up until that point included everyone answering the question, "What is your picture of love?"

Character qualities such as loving, caring, considerate, forgiving and several other typical personality traits that we all want in a mate were mentioned.

One guy in the room said something that made me say, "Wow!"

He says, "I want a woman who has a fast recovery."

He goes on to say that he wants someone he can disagree with and even argue with but then she recovers quickly. She doesn't hold onto "stuff" that keeps them from using that experience to help their relationship grow and become stronger.

Whew!! Ummm I don't quote R.Kelly often but that's whatchu call Real Talk.

But then my gf's mother mentions kind as a character quality in her picture of love. She also talks about how nice her husband is to her.

Everybody is taking their turn and other's are supposed to wait until the list is complete before chiming in but I cannot resist. Before I know it, my lips have parted and I say, "Don't you hate it when people are sooooo mean?"

She becomes even more animated than me.

"Yes, yeeeees, yeeeees," she says. "I cannot have someone in my life who is mean to me. Her father (my gf's father) was mean and I said, ugggh, I don't want him in my life because he is mean."

I've been in a relationship in the past in which some of the meanness things were said.

Whew! If I think about it toooo long, it will make tears stand in my eyes.

I would always wonder where it was coming from. Do people have a mean vault that they open up? How can someone who seems to be nice say some of the most cruel things? Why do people go from nice to nasty in a matter of seconds?

I'm clueless on the answers to those questions.

However, I think people underestimate the importance of being nice and kind in relationships.

Nice goes a long waaaaaay.

But I still want to know. Why are some people so nasty, sooooo ugly, soooo abrasive, sooooo mean? Has experience made people do this as a survival skill? Or is mean just part of a person's DNA?

Mean being in a person's DNA may sound like a ridiculous thing to say, but I think it is. It's the only thing I can come up with.

Mean is there simmering and when a situation arises a mean person IS just mean.

Just as much as a person is black or white or short or tall, a person is nice or mean?

Nice is a quiet, natural existence. You just know that a person is nice.

Mean is also a quiet, natural existence. You just know that a person mean.

What do you think about being nice and mean? They are qualities on opposite ends of the spectrum. Can a really nice person be really mean? Can a really mean person be really nice? Do life experiences make nice people mean? Can life experiences make a mean person nice? Have you ever been in a relationship with a really mean person or a person who said really mean things?

Share your thoughts with me here or e-mail me at choosingmrwrong@gmail.com.