“All I want to do is tell the truth about myself.”

Driving home from an argument with a former girlfriend, an argument wherein I was entirely in the right and she was entirely in the wrong, I began to rehearse the many things I said and the many things I could have said.  With the cold clarity that comes form being alone in a car, I began to realize there were many things I could have said that would have been so much wittier and biting than the things I actually did say.  Had I the time to plan and consider my points, I would have dropped the sickest burns and shown that awful B the errors of her ways.  I would have been so much more clever and humorous. 

So of course when I got to my friends house afterwards, I did not tell him the things I actually said, but the things I had developed during the car ride.  He kept me in beers while I told the story, full of lies about the situation but truths about myself.

I stand by that last assertion.  Sure, the things I told him I said were not the things I actually said.  But I was not myself when I was saying the things I actually said.  I was shocked and heartbroken and incredibly, incredibly pissed the hell off.  I stammered and stuttered and even blubbered a little.  Tears were shed.

In the car, I was able to collect myself, re-center as it were.  I was able to take a deep breath, helped along by the Kools I smoked at the time.  I returned to being the person I recognized as the person I was, a person in control of what he says, who says things that are insightful and cut to the heart of a matter, the kind of person who would totally “win” a breakup fight and then impress his buddy with how well he handled the whole thing.

So maybe I did fabricate a bit.  Maybe even parts of this are fabricated.  But now as then, all I want to do is tell the truth about myself.