my tragic flaw, according to my 17-year-old self

The last several days I've been going through all my old blog posts from my two previous blogs beginning at age 15. How embarrassing some of those posts are! I've started to put them into a format so I can publish it as a book for my own personal use; I really want to have a copy on my bookshelf! It has been really interesting to read my candid thoughts. I definitely was an annoying 15-year-old. Some of the posts are actually pretty decent. Here's one that I found that still totally applies to who I am today. I remember writing it after we were talking about tragic flaws in an English class.

Friday, December 12, 2003

wheel of fortune

I do. I trust you. I don't even know who you are, but I trust that you wont take what you read, and betray me. You don't even know me well enough to know how to betray me, but nevertheless, I trust you. I walk into relationships trusting, and I continue until that trust has been violated. Is this normal? Maybe. No matter what, it's how I function, how my world keeps spinning. It is how I feel like everything is still ok in the world. It is my justification for all of those starving kids in Africa, for all those children who are slaves in India, for all of those 8 year old girls stolen from their families and put in brothels, for all the things I can't control. It's those scary things that make me trusting. As contradicting as that sounds, it's true. If I give you a chance, if I trust you, if I believe in you, maybe I can do my part. And the thing is, even if you ruin me, eventually I'll forgive you. But, depending on the severity, I may never trust you again. Cunning, though, as you are, you will probably convince me that you aren't as bad as I'm making you out to be. It's not that I don't have any self-worth, and that I an attention seeking person who feeds on acceptance of others. It's far from that. I just like to think that the world is, in the end, a nice place. Sometimes I shelter myself, others I don't. I have met girls whose parents sold them into sexual slavery. My trust has been violated in the deepest way a child should ever know. Yet, I still trust. So, there it is: my tragic flaw. My trait that will, ultimately, (if I were a Shakespearean character) be the cause for my demise.

The only difference between me then and me now is I'm no longer able to believe that the world is truly a nice place anymore.