Of course I was aware, but after reading through my previous posts the other night I realised, again, that I am quite a negative person. Sarcasm, Irony, Cynicism, I’ve got them all down. It is positivity I have a hard time with.

I mean, there is so much stuff in life that is damn annoying. Headphones that always seem to be tangled when you are in a hurry. People in lines at the ATM that wait until it is their turn to start looking for their wallet in their oversized bag. Men, that tell you to smile (seriously, fuck that). Sleet. Never being able to find scissors when you need them. Birth control (all options suck). Delayed trains and stingy people. Trust me I can go on and on and on.

Being harsh, straight to the point and not overtly positive is in my nature and considered a Dutch trait. Let’s blame the consistently bad weather for that one. The whole greeting ritual of “hey, how are you?”, “yes I am great!” is not very Dutch. We took it from American shows like Friends and incorporated it in our daily routine. Of course, it is nice to be greeted like this but don’t you just sometimes want to say “how I am? well, as you can see, I just biked an hour through the fucking rain and am cold and wet. Also, I cried a bit yesterday, that is why my eyes look like this. And when I get home I am considering to go to bed and stay there for the foreseeable future. Yes, I am just dandy.” Instead of the obligatory “Great!, Smile!”.

All this moaning does not mean that I do not enjoy things like good food, a great conversation with friends, music, books, any time spent with the Kid, new shoes, etc. I enjoy those things immensely. My negativity has more to do with future perspective and a sense of morbid reality. One of the things my Anxiety Disorder taught me is that Life is not that great all the time.

Most of the time we are just muddling through and I think it is better to be honest about that, then to plaster on the smile “others” want us to wear. In the end, it will make life less lonely to share our misery with each-other. Plus, let’s face it, pessimism and negativity are much funnier and leave more room to talk then positivity does. A lot of time unfounded positivity can even work as a thought terminating cliché (dooddoener). Like those times, you tell a friend you are worried about some thing or other and you get the: “oh you’ll be right.” Which leaves you with…. absolutely nothing!

Anyway, what I wanted to convey and did not do very well, is that my negativity is not all encompassing. I enjoy Life. And am positive about certain things. Overly positive even, about some impossible stuff. I do not, however, wish to gloss over the things that suck. In the end, the things that suck are the things that make Life challenging, funny and worth changing for.