By the time we reach our mid-20s, we've realized that outside of work we don't have to be around people we don't like. Why not spend it simply around those we deem worth of wasting days away with? But sometimes our close friends have others they deem worth and try to integrate them into the group. And sometimes these people are just the worst.
You find yourself wondering how you share a mutual friend with this horrible person. Maybe you need to cut off your friend so you don't have to hang around their friend. No, that would be dick-ish. So you attempt to see what your friend sees in them, but all you realize is that they're as swallow, selfish, overly-opinionated, unconsciously racist/misogynistic, and heavy-footed as you thought they were. They even borrowed your roommate's favorite shirt without asking and stretched it out. Not to mention they're the worst kind of drunk: loud.
If I'm being honest with you, I just described a combination of horrible people I've had run-ins with. More recently, I've garnered the drunk confidence to tell one to their face all the ways they piss people [read: me] off. I felt like a champion of the people: I rid the evil cursing the land by making the beast cry and run to the bathroom. In hindsight, I was terrible for that, but it felt so good in that moment.
Oddly enough, that did not repel them from our friend group. It actually made them come around more often, and for a while I couldn't figure out why.
Then I remembered one of the best cancelled yet cult classic TV shows of our time: Freaks and Geeks. It's on Netflix if you've never seen it. [Not a sponsored blog... yet.] In the show, one of the protagonist Lindsay joins the "Freaks" of the school. In this group of Freaks is a girl named Kim Kelly, girlfriend to the boy Lindsay kind of has a crush on. Obviously they don't get along, but the animosity is mostly from Kim's side.
About halfway through the season, Kim begins to cling to Lindsay, much to Lindsay's bewilderment. Soon she finds that Kim Kelly's home life is nothing like her own. She basically lives in a shack compared to Lindsay's house. Kim's mother yells at her daughter and tells her she's nothing. Relatives are passed out (presumably drunk) on furniture. Eventually, Lindsay realizes how one's environment can shape a person to act crass, rude, and like everyone's out to get them. The girls' friendship blossoms from that point.
It reminded me that everyone has their backstory, some darker than others. Soon I learned the loud drunk's past struggles and hardship. We bonded over similarities I was unaware we shared. I grew to understand and like this character. My blind rage was replaced with compassion.
This is not to say they don't annoy me anymore; they still have their moments. I tease them any opportunity I get to balance it out. It's my way of making them pay for their past transgressions. They're about caught up.
It is at this moment that I am proud to announce that.... Taylor Swift is my friend. I know, I know. I've been #teamKanye for years. But she's proven herself to not be all bad. I mean, we have the same taste in TV shows so that helps. (Except Doctor Who. Who has the time, am I right? Oh, you do? Well, never mind...) This doesn't mean I listen to her songs, though. Her taste in music is still trash, but we've found ways to overcome this.
So open your hearts, my dear friends and associates, to that person you can't stand. There's a reason they're so crazy. Perhaps you'll become close friends. Or not. Sometimes people are a little too messed up. Know when to back away. Stay sane.
Word.
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