Optimist or Just Plain Naive?

I’m an optimist.  Things are gonna work out, baby. < See?  Optimism.

My father used to tell me that I was the most naive person he knew.  That life wasn’t all sunshine and blue birds, Sunshine.

I’d kiss his cheek, tell him I loved him and that it wasn’t naivety that he was witnessing, it was trust.

I might have been wrong.  Oh man, I might have been the most naive person he knew.

Let me backtrack.  When I say “trust” that only applies to those I know and love, and um, trust.  If you’re one of those people, and you tell me anything, I’m believing the words coming out of your mouth.  Trust, yo.

Recently, I had the opportunity to grasp the concept that some that I love might not be worthy of that trust.  I’d been told by some that I should guard against believing this one’s words, but as one does that loves another, I brushed off what they saw; I refused to open my eyes to the truth.

Today I see.

I’ve been duped.  I’ve been too trusting.  I’ve been naive.

I wondered, in the aftermath, if my father was sending me a saddened I told you so.

The thing is…there’s always a thing, right?…is that I wanted to believe.  I couldn’t bring myself to consider that the words I was being told might not be the truth.  I mean, they loved me too, right?  Why would someone who loves me lie to me?  Over and over and over and over again?

I still don’t have an answer for that.

I’ve blamed myself.  Maybe I was this or wasn’t that. Maybe they saw no other way.  Maybe they thought it was a kindness.

That nonsense stopped the moment I saw. It was as if I actually heard someone snap their fingers and I was in a different reality of seeing the truth.  ~SNAP~ No more blame.

There is no reason to lie to someone you love, over the course of years, for any reason other than life or death.  Or at least, that’s how I see it.

Lesson learned.  Or is it?

On one hand, I am still that optimistic soul.  It’s my DNA, baby.  I gots my own personal bluebird flock.

On the other, there is now one person whose words will be worthy of a higher level of scrutiny before I believe whatever it is that comes out of their mouth.  Gotta pay if you’re gonna play that game, right?

Right.

I prayed for peace after my moment of clarity and the unveiling of what had previously been hidden.  Peace for me that I wouldn’t strike back in anger and peace for the person that had lied so easily and freely.

Since then, I have gotten my peace, as I pray they have gotten theirs.

After a few days had passed and I had time to reflect without the heat of fresh anger, I wondered if my dad had been right all along.  Was I the most naive person he had ever known or was I simply trusting those I loved?

I’m going with the latter.  I’m always going with trust.  It’s how I’m bent.

That is unless I’m shown otherwise.

Come on bluebirds!  Let’s fly!

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