if it is a fiction, it is a pleasant one

next week's game: truth or fiction. i tested it yesterday and it went fabulously. teaching kids to lie in english--they need to know how to do it right.

perhaps we'll get into tells. i don't want them to be too good at it. we'll see.

speaking of which, i was a bald-faced lying little bastard when i was a kid, and it's been only recently that i've realized that i had largely gotten away with it. i just assumed that everyone in my family had known this, because i got caught from time to time, and it turned into a bit of a game for me. my perception being that everyone knew i was always lying, but they just couldn't prove it. but over the past couple of years, i've had individual conversations with certain members of my family who seemed to be wholly unaware of this side of me... last week, my mom accused me of having been "such a good, honest little boy," and i had to set her straight.

in my early twenties, i recognized this as a (flaw?)(obstacle to my chosen aesthetic?) and i had to make a major change. no more lies. on the whole, it worked out, but of course if Courtney happens to read this, she will no doubt feel that this is, itself, a bit of a fiction. she and i had started out in this new world of mine, in which total honesty prevails, but i allowed myself some lapses in some difficult situations, after the honesty had proven just to be a trouble-maker. again, i had to learn my lesson on this. after the split, i recommitted, and with the exception of the occasional omission (which i will usually come back around and correct in time) i've turned into a pretty honest guy. but it's kind of a spiritual thing for me, meditative. truthfulness leads to understanding of path. honesty with self, even when it takes a while to see some of those things about yourself you need to admit, leads to movement along path. owing truth to others is a secondary debt, it is owed primarily to self, at which point it will be freely given to others. (just don't be a dick and say things like "i'm just being honest" because that really means "i'm trying to hurt your feelings and i'm hiding behind self-righteousness"--i think)

stories are better, too, when one's main concern is truth. even fiction. especially fiction.