The Answer Must Be Behind Door Number 2!

I find myself in a hard position.

There is a certain air of hypocrite-crap when it comes down to not liking someone, yet still having to work with them and all that jazz.

Personally, I find it hard to do more than be polite and meet the standards of being a nice person without them noticing that I'm avoiding/ignoring them, even making it natural to do business with a quick hello and goodbye. My response to someone who, for some reason, isn't in my path of "friend," I guess isn't a great one. I'm sure that, if I looked past the odds and ends of reasons that first brought them to just "Yeah, I'm acquaintances," there would probably be something of a friendship.

But I think about what I would think if I found out that someone was really being my friend when, in all reality, talked behind my back, never truly liked me or something to that effect. Where is that line of "Polite" and "Liar"?

I seem to have defined it as I just don't hang out with them on my free time. I try not to offer my free time up to them, unless it happens to be somethings simple as "Have a cup of sugar." Anything past (such as a DVD or video game), I wouldn't give it to many other people either, so I feel as if I am in my rights. One of the worst things is giving someone the wrong impression, so when I see someone acting the friend, yet not to their face, I begin to wonder where anything lies, especially with the people I myself call friends (am I in that same position?). I am reminded of high school.

To be honest, why waste time around someone who doesn't make you happy? In any situation, unless dire to a job or something to equal value, there is simply no reason to give someone the wrong impression or lead them on in any way. But it's hard to do that without coming off as someone who's cold/a complete bitch. The balance is hard to find (unless being a complete bitch is appropriate, such as a cheating boyfriend, spouse or someone who uses their free time to make yours a living hell).

So, there's me, who doesn't like to give the wrong idea and just does pretty much the bare minimum, but then there are friends who, though they talk about only wanting to do the bare minimum, and do more. And I'm curious. The first presumption is that they are only doing this because, even though they dislike this person, they still care about their opinion and do the opposite of what they want to appease. Or, they are being nice because, beyond their judgment, they know that being nice is better than being curt-polite.

Either way, if I think they're doing it for caring about their opinion, I think, why? Why give the time of day to what they think?

Ah, the all tell-time question that is hard to figure out and keep the answer at ready hand. If we do give the time to an opinion, it's because we care about what at least someone thinks. Otherwise, there isn't a second thought. I don't know if I'm being awesome at not having a curb around what I do or if I'm just being a jerk. Because if I weren't being a jerk, wouldn't everyone else be doing what they've been saying they want to do, rather than skirting the issue and allowing their feelings be misunderstood? So, am I being difficult because I can't appease or because I'm not that better person to look beyond judgment?

The position I really find myself in is difficult because if I choose to not be around any person that makes me unhappy, it usually means me being the left-one-out. Typically, there would be others around so I wouldn't have the difficult decision, but since summer approached, there is literally no one but staff here to keep everyone interested. I'm not necessarily unhappy, but extremely awkward, for no particular reason except that this person is extremely awkward. I find myself strained for conversation besides the mundane, and I feel as if anything I say is sucked into his life form which is dying for some sort of human contact. Normally, I'm okay with this sort of thing, but, normally, the person hadn't at one point asked me out. Now, it's not just his socially awkwardness that adds to the situation, but the awkwardness of me saying, "Sorry, but no... I've just got too much on my plate."

And then that, not even knowing him for a month, or ever seeing him outside of a one hour class, he said, over the phone, "You can't hear it, but I'm pretty sure my room mate heard my heart break."

It's really a mix of everything. I don't know how to react to a sentence like that when I've never gotten any guy saying something even close to a romantic setting of watching a movie. I barely know the guy. And there's a kind of creepy, awkward feeling to him.

Plus, that's really a cheesy line. Would only work on, like, the tenth date. Seriously. I don't date and I know this.

So, really, the situation consists of this person now hanging out with my staff friends because he's now on staff. And since they don't know him, knowing only of what I've said (and because I'm not the type of person to come out and say "Don't hang out with him!" since I believe in other's getting their own opinion without me trying to manipulate their ideas), he's slowly making his way more and more into the daily activities I do.

I've decided to really take this as a time to work on taking the past person I knew and allowing myself to see that people do change. As my mother once said, "People change. This doesn't mean you have to go all out and be their friend, but you could see that something has changed to where you can be comfortable around them." And I know that my polite to someone I know is usually short, curt and to the point. Usually making me seem like I'm not as polite with want, but need. Which usually equals Bitch.

An opportunity to take, and we'll see how I do. It's almost a must, to be honest. We're a small staff, and there is that decision of looking beyond judgment and sucking it up. But I do have to look to my own securities. I simply do not want this person hanging in my room at this point. I really won't be able to handle certain situations, and rather than me be an immature adult (more of one, I should say), it's better to not even get into the point until I feel I can handle it.

And as for the friends who can't decide which side they are on, whether they even see a side, I have to realize that that is their choice. I can tell them my own insecurities, and hope they understand and can tell me theirs, but their decisions are something I can't control. And I don't want to control them. Trying to control myself is hard enough as it is.

A thought: Even if a person has changed, it's hard for me to get rid of the old image I once had of a person, as that's the one we're left with. We almost don't want to leave that image, in case we see a small inkling of that old person, so we can scream out that we're right or to at least save ourselves some hurt for the future. But if we had been there during that change, proof of what they'd been through, we're more likely to stick around. But, in this world of "It's everyone for themselves!" it's... well, it's everyone for themselves.

I hope that someday I can get past that and realize that, in order to cause change, we have to understand it and go through some ourselves. Because there is living life... and living it. The latter has always been my favorite and most memorable.

Random Fact: The lifespan of a taste bud is 10 days