A friend of mine recently got broken up with, for of all reasons, that she earns too much. She dated a regular joe, blue collar factory guy for 5 months, and never was there a problem really (besides the occasional out-of-your-element moments at the martini bar I suppose).

But to know what he said about himself, it is heart breaking. "I am only this. I am only that. Just a nobody factory worker. You deserve something so much more than me." Hearing that made me want to put my arm around the guy and ask "Hey man, why do you feel that way?"

Of course, I have not been a stranger to those kinds of sentiments, so I really do feel for the guy. He knows how he is going to be judged by many women, and the mistake he made was that he applied it to someone who already accepted him the way he is! Playing the percentages is for wimps.

In the end, his own low self esteem was his (and her) undoing, and so my friend threw her arms in the air because she didn't think that way about the guy at all. He made her happy, and when you tear down all of the attitudes, the bullshit, the expectations - that is what we all want the bottom line to reflect.

You see, guys want to be the hero, and we are conditioned to think that being the breadwinner is the way to achieve it. I think there are a million ways I can be a hero to someone, each having nothing to do with money. Seeing as more women than men are attending college nowadays, and the gap for grad school being even wider, I expect these kinds of problems to only become more plentiful.

If I were in that situation, I would just be really happy for her as long as she didn't hold it against me. She can buy all the diamonds and great clothes in the world, and I would love to see her in them, and I would be proud of her. I feel so damn bad for my friend. She did the best she could and still ended up getting the short end because of something that had nothing to do with her.

Do you see that we are always finding new reasons to reject people and push them away? One thing I'm learning is that when you push people away, sometimes you are really going to wish you hadn't.

Find a reason to pull people into your life instead.

......and not everyone is forgiving. See, sometimes even when you want to do the right thing, you will not earn a good result for yourself. Sometimes you make mistakes. Sometimes people are content to be bitter. Sometimes a heartfelt apology doesn't work. All you can do is try your best, and work on the damage control.

It made me think about whether or not it is better to just skip to the end and be a total jerk, because you will be treated like one anyway, made fun of, so on and so forth. It is really tempting to say all the nasty things you've always wanted to say, to hurt them, or at least to make yourself feel better for a while.

Or maybe it is better to just not give a damn what people say, because most of them are ignorant, full of shit to begin with, and have no impact on your life whatsoever. They will throw you under the bus. They are non-entities. Their opinion is worth as much as a rock's opinion. We all know who matters and who doesn't.

I don't think either approach will work. Being a jerk from the beginning means compromising your principles, and risking alienating the people who you care about, as well as potential new friends. Not giving a damn means closing off opportunities to have more people in your life who you care about. You can't just not care. It doesn't work that way.

Maybe the compromise is to just be ruthless with people when they really deserve it. Nobody ever got anywhere taking it on the chin all the time. Maybe, in some cases, Islamic justice goes along with human nature.

I'm reminded of what my uncle said to me one time when I wasn't doing so good. I'd link it but I don't remember what post it was I relayed the story. Anyhow, he asked me if I stepped on any ants when I walked outside. I said that I didn't know, that I had no idea if I stepped on any ants. He said I could relate that to my own circumstances, that I shouldn't be mad at God or the world, that sometimes people are in the wrong place at the wrong time, just like the ant I might have stepped on.

I'm in the wrong place at the wrong time. God help me. I hope everyone who is worried about their family finds the strength to cope. Lord knows, when you think you've got it bad, you are always shown someone has it worse than you.

Arrivaderci

My penchant for tinkering failed me this time. Buddhatron V2.0 won't be up until next week. It was fantastic while it was working, though!

Yes, it is time to upgrade, although I think spending lots of money on computer parts is going to become decreasingly feasible, especially if one day I have a family and whatnot. Anyhow, UPS should have everything to my door by tomorrow. Here's what I got (leaving out most of the detail):

nVidia GeForce 8800 GTS 320MB
500 GB SATA Hard Drive (For lots of HD media)
2 Gigs Corsair RAM
2.66Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo 6750

Hopefully, this will allow me to play HD media and the newest games for at least a few years, and will be upgradeable enough where I don't have to put out so much freaking money when I want new parts.