I'm Getting Old---For Better or for Worse

Admittedly, I can be one mean soul---uhmm, soul seems inappropriate, yes? B*tch nails it better. In retrospect, I've been this way since I can remember, and I carried this mean, mean character flaw with me through adulthood. I remember being 10 and learning that somebody's (someone widely disliked in the neighborhood, my mother included) house is being seized by the bank, and boy, was I ecstatic. And I so gleefully recounted this juicy tidbit to my mother, thinking that she would share with my happiness and do the dance of joy with me (figuratively, of course---the dancing gene was probably on its sabbatical when it was our turn to inherit it; either that or my family's cerebellum is hopelessly deformed). My happiness was short-lived though, as I was met with my mother's icy stare (and this is a VERY.BIG.BAD.DEAL because my mother is almost always warm and chirpy, even at five-friggin-in-the-morning! ) and harsh admonition that I should never, never, and oh-have-I-forgotten NEVER find happiness in the misery of others! Of course, there are times, okay, many times, truth be told, that I'd conveniently forget her lecture; like I said, I carried this mean streak till adulthood. This morning, though, with nothing to do---Sharkteeth is with my parents, hopefully being given lessons on being forgiving and basic human values by my mother, TheHusband is still sleeping, and TheDog is doing the usual rounds of the village---I surfed Friendster instead and saw the site of someone I'm mildly pissed at (okay, I hate her guts, satisfied?) and learned that her significant other left her shortly after she gave birth to their baby. Any other time, I would have felt devilishly joyous, but, apparently, not today---as I felt utterly sad for her and her baby. I know she can handle it, she's a strong woman, and she has her family who'll support her always; it's just sad that the baby might not even know his father and I'm sure that she really loved him and is heartbroken. Plus, it's so darn irritating, to say the least, when the baby wakes at two in the morning with dirty nappies and you've been sleepless since you've given birth and have no one else to kick awake to change the baby's nappy!