You may grieve the loss of:

• A friend, family member, partner or pet.
• A marriage, friendship or another form of kinship.
• Your home, neighborhood or community.
• Your job or career.
• Financial stability.
• A dream or goal.
• Good health.
• Your youth.

I am grieving, the cause of which is not on the list.  I grieve my loss of ability to trust people.  I don’t believe people are honest with me.  I don’t believe people believe me when I am honest with them, that I only offer direction when I know someone is missing their best path.  And I grieve I am not alone in this.

Maybe we don’t view this ability to trust actually holds enough value to be considered, fathomed or valued.  Maybe people hold a perception of someone or something that is impenetrable or so steeped in their convenience that they dispel all evidence that should be part of the full picture they see.  Someone once said to me that the real definition of friendship is embracing all the qualities a person possesses, those that are convenient and those that aren’t.  You don’t get to pick the ones you like as if you’re picking flowers to arrange in a vase.  I like sun flowers, carnations, and tulips yet I detest tea roses.  They’re just too needy for me.

Well maybe some us have a tea rose in our DNA.  Maybe we can’t tuck it away for your sake.  So when a floral arrangement is delivered to your door and it contains tea roses, will you toss it in the garbage altogether or just pick them out?  Frankly, I’d prefer the prior.  If I am too direct for you, discard me.  Please. If I care so much that I question a choice that you may regret, you have options;

it’s not your business is one and discarding the source is another.  

Go with the full out discarding.  I’m not about to play the version of me you prefer.  You can’t like one side of me but not another.  I’m not a box.  

You may be thinking, what the hell is going on with him?  Why this sobering tale of woe?  I thought he just wrote funny sh*t.  Perhaps you don’t like this entry and wish to pick it out, but you can’t.  Just throw all of the ingredients into the trash.  

So what brought this all on?  A publishing house conditionally contracted a book I wrote. Conditionally.  That means satisfying very specific demands they feel are necessary to meet in order to increase the marketability of the piece.  I don’t want to do it.  I honestly could care less about what they want it to be.  They can format their own version.  I mean I thought about it, a lot.  There’s money to be made.  Just how willing would I be to change stuff … much of which is true and based on more than just my perception.  I want to tell them to go to hell.  I want to know what sparked their interest and now sparks their demands.  

So I am grieving.  I grieve the lack of trust that has strung me along for a month or two.  I want to tell them to eff off.  Some might say to take the deal.  The money involved is not all that substantial.  Sure it would be nice.  Maybe I’d buy a fancy car.  Then I think that every time I get behind that wheel I’d fear it wouldn’t start or the navigation would get me lost or that it would run out of gas because the fuel gauge wasn’t telling me the truth.  

Oh take the car and get over yourself one might say.  I already have a car.  I already wrote a book.  You liked it, but you’re only interested in selling your version.

I am more interested in people reading the one I wrote.  As soon as someone senses the words aren’t yours, they’ll never believe you again.  That’s important.