The past 2 years

2017 was a year of rude awakening, betrayal, corruption, lies.

2018 was a year of grieving the losses, and acceptance.

2019 is a year of change, and learning to be happy again.

2020..... oh, you wait, gurl..........

compliments that actually DID hurt...

I was remembering that two of the most flattering and undeserved compliments of which I am aware, are also two memories that make me choke up, even after all of these years....

The first was this scenario: 

SHE and I are hanging out on a random weekend night. We cross paths with HER friend, HIM.

Much later when HE and I are friends, he drunkenly confides:

When we met, I thought you were a stuck up bitch. I even told SHE when we met. But then SHE told me (loosely translated except the most important words) Oh, gosh, give Bex a chance. She's "one of the coolest people I know" (see? I'm choking up again...) And HE did. Then HE and I were friends for a long while. But we aren't really friends any longer. Huh. Guess I AM a stuck up bitch. 

And SHE? Well, I think SHE changed her mind. I wasn't really cool at all... 

See how a compliment CAN hurt? 

Scenario deux:

I'm dating someone. It's a horrible unhealthy relationship, as every time he drinks, he is EXTREMELY verbally abusive. (But he never hit!, so ... of course, he'd change for ME, right? ugh. I was VERY naive!)

We were at a club, all slithery drunk; that's what we DID, as I said, VERY unhealthy... I lived on the dance floors then, big hair glued in place, when a stranger approached my boyfriend to tell him that I was a "beautiful girl. No dude, MODEL beautiful" ... That was another painful compliment that I learned about as my drunk boyfriend relayed the story later that night, the words in quotations seared into my memory as he SNEERingly hurled them AT me, then told me he guesses I am a whore. I wasn't. 

are you okay?

If you began to date a man, who immediately stuck a copy of " The 48 Laws Of Power" into your hands, and insisted you must study and learn them like a college student... including heavy HIGHLIGHTER use...would that be weird? Asking for a frenemy...