Facing Up to When You Are an Awful Person

Not everything that I've ever said or done in my life is something that I can look back on with pride.
Much if it, I certainly can't.

I am perfectly capable of being kind, generous and thoughtful.

I am also capable of being cruel, callous and vindictive.

I guess what really matters is how sorry we are when we look at the results of the second.

Here's a tale of a way I behaved in many years ago, which will haunt me for the rest of my life.

When I was a student, there was a lad lived in the same halls as a friend of mine. I'll call him Barry, though that wasn't his name.
Barry came out at University. This is a hard thing for anyone to do, especially in an environment that isn't as open minded and tolerant as it likes to think it is.
And at that point I was not as open minded, or tolerant as I liked to think.

Barry started having a relationship with a boy from the town. The boy in question was younger than him. It is a borderline issue, certainly in terms of ethics, but in retrospect, it can't have been easy for Barry at this time. His head was probably a little messed up.

We were out one Friday and Barry came up to talk to my friend. I blanked Barry.
When I reached for a cigarette, Barry asked me for one.
I remember my reply vividly, because at the time, I was proud of it.

'Did you just ask me for a fag, faggot?'
He looked shocked. I continued.
'Don't EVER ask me for a fag. Don't ever speak to me. Don't give people the impression we're friends, or that I even know you. You take yourself off over there. As far as I am concerned, you're filth. You are ruining the life of a boy who knows no better and you should be ashamed. So It wouldn't bother me too much if you took yourself outside and jumped off the f***ing pier.'

He departed, wordless.

I thought myself so superior.



Three months later, Barry stood in front of a train.

I don't suppose my words on their own made him do it, but I feel sure they were just another one of the straws that finally broke the camels back.

I can't forget that my last words to a man who ended up killing himself, were words which effectively told him to do just that.

And I have never apologised to anyone, because I don't know who to direct an apology to.

But one thing I do know. My life's not always been easy, but I have never even considered doing what he did.

The pain of his daily existence must have been unendurable, in a way I can't even comprehend.

And I was part of the problem, not the solution.

One of many awful actions I have to live with.