Filters

TD and I were talking a while ago and he told me how nice I was. Instead of just agreeing and moving on, I told him, " Well, sometimes I don't feel like a nice person. I don't always have the nicest thoughts. I just don't share them." He said, "That's what part of being a nice person is." I always thought you just had to have only nice thoughts all of the time, which I have to admit is pretty boring. Remember that part in Steel Magnolias where Olympia Dukakis said, " If you don't have something nice to say, come and sit by me." Spicy comments seem to spice up the world.
Like yesterday. I was at the Y and lucky for me, the escalator became free just as soon as I walked in. On the other one, was a little blonde girl and next to her on a regular stair stepper was another little blonde girl. I say girl, but they are two women who have some sort of exercise bulimia and workout for hours at a time. I say, to each his own, but they hog the machines for literally hours at a time and they have kids in childwatch, which can't be fun for them. Anyway, for once, both of them weren't on the machines. I got my stuff together and was untangling my earphones when I heard one say to the other that she was planning to get on the escalator in three minutes and now she wasn't going to be able to. Instead of channeling my own Liz Lemon and yelling, "Suck it Blondie", I merely put my headphones in a climbed on the escalator and sweated myself silly.
It's tough as I get older. When I was younger, I let people walk all over me and say whatever they wanted because I was afraid they wouldn't like me or want to be my friend any more. In the last few years, probably because I had to speak up for Fiona, I have taken a lot less crap and been less willing to excuse others' bad behaviors. So far, my filters are still working and I am able to keep my snarky comments to myself, except to TD because he finds it funny and frankly sometimes I do too.
I just hope as I get older, I will keep those filters. I certainly don't want to become one of those old people who figures that since they are going to die soon anyway, they shouldn't have to keep it to themselves. I also want to keep my more assertive self. I want to be able to tell it like it is without being rude. I don't want to say whatever just because I can.