Secrets.

They say what you don't know can't hurt you, but I've been pondering on this statement for quite a while recently. It's a statement that is used at least once everyday somewhere in the world by somebody trying to protect themselves, or to stop themselves from hurting another person. But isn't it the not knowing that hurts? We all have secrets and we all have the right to privacy, but when these secrets involve someone else, is it really a secret? And is it your right to keep it a secret?

By not telling people, you are keeping things botttled up, and talking from experience, bottling things up is never a good idea. Why? Because eventually, you will have bottled so much up that one day your gonna pop the cork(excuse the pun) and just erupt a whole galleon of emotion. And that's when people's worlds seem to come crumbling down, because they've had this build up and build up and then a final release, but in this release all they've done is show that they have made life a little more difficult for themselves than they should have.

Aren't we all encouraged to be honest and open? And isn't 'honesty the best policy?'. And if so, then why do we tell lies? Why do we hide secrets? Is it because we are afraid of hurting someone? Is it because we are afraid of being hurt ourselves? Or is it because we are too embarassed to admit to feeling something we dont want to? Or, is it because we are ashamed of ourselves? Are we keeping secrets to avoid shame and embarassment, or just pure hurt?

Can you live with the guilt (if you are guilty...) of having a secret that could destroy somebody elses whole world? In a matter of seconds, trust can be broken, but in a matter of months it can be re-built. But if someone has been dishonest and broken your trust, can you ever forgive them? You might say that yes, you trust them again, but you know deep inside that you don't and you might never trust them again.

I once ended a relationship on the basis of broken trust. I still talk to the guy as friends, though it is not often. But I don't trust him like I used to and I doubt that I ever will. And yet here I am, sitting wondering what I should do because I've got myself into a bit of a predicament (no, I'm not going to tell you what it is...!).

And having got myself into this predicament, its bringing up issues about myself. Am I really this dishonest disloyal person? Is that really who I want to be? And if not, why don't I come clean? What am I afraid of? What is the worst that could happen? And if I am any sort of decent human, wouldn't I, out of pure respect for the other person, tell them that I am shit at life? Am I afraid of loosing them? And even if I want to come clean, how do I do it? Do I sit them down over a coffee and be like "Um, Im sorry but Im a dick?". Or do I tell them via telephone, text, email? How do you go about spilling your secrets?

I don't want to be dishonest. I don't want to be who I seem to have become. Yet, I still can't help wondering if its better for all of us If I lived with my own guilt and left everyone else out of it. This brings me back to my first statement about what you dont know can't hurt you. In matters of the mind and heart, what do you do when you have a secret that should be spilled but you just cant seem to spill it?

Adventures in Manland.

I know it’s been a while since my last update, but really, I’ve had no inspiration whatsoever due to the stresses of my life. As an A level student I am consistently required to be working at least 12 hours a day. Impossible, I know, but that’s the general consensus.

So the “lucky” woman that I am, I got to be privileged to go on an adventure into man-land. Man-land, my friends, is specifically, male territory, or a male night out. And no, I didn’t have to put a sock down my pants and pretend to be a male, I was there as a “girlfriend”. Don’t ask. So anyway, I decided that since I often whine about men and how shit they are it would be useful to blog about my adventure in man-land, and I know the males are looking forward to my critical opinion :P!

Upon arrival, I discovered a living room full of 5 males drinking beer and playing poker. Since I have no clue about how to play poker, I let them get on with it and sat and smiled like an idiot. During this stage of the night, I “overheard” the remark ‘ham sandwich’ followed by ‘spaghetti junction’ – and they didn’t mean it in the way of ‘I would like a ham sandwich or some spaghetti please…’ Take the comments into a sexual context, and then you’ll understand. Now, I’m not sure of what exactly was meant, or was suggested as I wasn’t supposed to hear the comment but I did. Note to men: Women aren’t deaf and they will hear everything you say while in the same room.

But moving on from the sex remark. There are some things I want to pick up on about men, one being Beer. Beer is a man-drink, without a hell of a doubt. But when your man is drinking beer, it puts me right off. I do not want to kiss your smelly beer breath cause I don’t want the beer breath myself. The second thing, Football, shortly after I was greeted and introduced, I was informed about the football associations of the group. It was like two for Arsenal or Chelsea or something blue, and Two for Liverpool, and Liverpool had just won and so there was a bit of a male atmosphere of “WE WON, FUCK YOU NERNERNAHAHA’. Delightful, absolutely delightful. Note to men: Girls do not give a living shit about football (unless they tell you specifically that they are and want to take you to a football match). I just don’t get what fun it is to kick a football around a field. Although, I stated this and was given back the statement that ‘Football is to men, what shopping is to women’. Fair enough. You stick to the football and we’ll stick to the shopping.

After leaving the house party, we moved on to a bar that we sometimes frequent. Although this bar was shit because it was headbangers night, so we left that one and moved onto another called ‘The Back Bar’. You can guess why it’s called this, because it’s at the back of another bar, well done, you’re smart. This bar wasn’t so bad, though I had never been there before and wasn’t entirely comfortable with going out of my safety zone with 4 people I barely knew, but I did. One thing I must note about this bar, is the fact that it was full of older people trying to pull and it played random tunes, but what the hey it was fun anyway. During the night, a song was request by one of my guy friends, called ‘White Lines’ – you can only guess what its about. But we were all standing in a circle when it came on and suddenly they all just started singing and moving while I stood there like a true girl, water in hand (hey, I was ill) and watched them with critical eyes, wondering just what the hell they were on about. I have to admit though, watching 4 guys move and sing consecutively was pretty funny. But following this, there were other songs, and my friends, I’m a girl and I cannot dance, but my god, those boys cannot dance! But in a good natured and friendly way, it was nice that they tried and made the effort to do so.

As the night wore on, drinks were piling in, beer after beer while I still had my one glass of water. They did try to argue with me and try to get me to drink but my statement of ‘If I have another alcoholic beverage, I will vomit on your shoes’ seemed to shut them up. So as they were getting drunker and drunker, I was getting even more sober (if that’s possible). One of the guys I was with started flirting with me which was nice in a way (even though, yes I am taken at the moment), but it’s always nice to know that there are still others out there who wouldn’t mind a piece of your ass (yes, I did just say that). So, a little flirting went on (if my man is reading this – it’s woman’s nature to flirt and you know it…!) and it was nice to flirt again with someone new, even if we both knew nothing would happen. And it was nice to talk to someone else, to learn a little bit about them and make a new connection, a new friend with them, no matter how drunk they were, or how bad they were at rock paper scissors.

At some stage during the night, when some people were drunk-tastic, we had some thumb wars (I let the side down girls and lost repeatedly!) but I did win pretty much at rock paper scissors which followed after thumb wars. The guy I was playing RPS with was drunk as hell, and when he lost he yelled ‘I am going to hell, me and Hitler and Stalin in hell!’ Good luck with that one, my friend. But I very much doubt you are going to hell because you lost rock paper scissors.

On a more serious note, it must be a guy thing, because they pick thee worst times to ask people serious and important questions. In the middle of a bar, full of drunken people and perverts, one of the guys said to the other ‘I am going to propose to my girlfriend later this year. Will you be my best man?’ Now, as sweet as it is that they were considering their friend for such an important job, I don’t quite think it was the right time to ask. I said this to the best man, and he said it was a guy thing, that it takes time and a lot of courage (via alcohol) to ask someone such a question. So in that aspect, I suppose I can see the point. But I still feel there was a better time and place for such questions to be proposed. But each to their own, really.

So, I seem to have written quite a lot on Man-land, but have gained no real insight to the complex sex we call the male species. But one thing I will mention is that women are right about one thing, men are worried about their penis size, and they do feel good if they are bigger than their friends and sometimes during flirting they actually like you, and want to take you there and then. Well note to men, sometimes women want you to take us there and then too. Unfortunately, it’s never the right time, the right place, or the right person.

And here ends my adventure into Man-land. And I admit, it wasn't that bad, it could have been worse. Now, if only I was a fly on the wall to find out what it's like when women aren't actually around (haha).