There are some moments in life when I sit back and think about how awful I am. This has nothing to do with self-esteem, it has everything to do with the awful things that roll through my mind. The worst part about the things that cross my mind is that I have a hard time not saying it aloud. I often think I’m just not wired right in the head. My lack of empathy for certain circumstances makes me feel awkward and horrible. Not horrible because I thought it, but because I feel like I should feel guilty. Luckily, I can take comfort in the fact that no matter how awful I am that there’s always someone worse than me.

The first moment it hit me that I was a little off was when I was a Junior in high school. My English teacher was trying to explain the idea of a tragedy to us by asking us if it was a tragedy that a girl runs across the street chasing a ball and gets hit by a car and dies. After a few people, she turns to me and asked me if I thought it was a tragedy. “No, it wasn’t a tragedy,” I blurted  out, realizing what I had said without really thinking about it. “No? Why not?”, she asked with a stunned or appalled look on her face. “Because if she was too stupid to look both ways first, it was going to happen. That’s not a tragedy, it’s natural selection.” I figured I was already in everyone’s “crazy bitch” category, so why not just finish my thought aloud. Lucky for me, I think the teacher thought I was trying to be funny and let me off the hook without much more than an appalled look. That was the moment I realized that I was an awful person.

Eventually I learned to at least try to keep my mouth shut with age, though some days were more trying than others. There are some occasions with people I trust where I don’t care. The other day we were driving back from my son’s baseball practice, I saw a person on a bike towing a full bag of trash without a helmet cut off a SUV. Obviously, the truck won and he was on the road in pain. People got out and pulled out their cellphones, hoping for this kid. I looked at my husband and before I knew it “What the heck did he think would happen trying to cut off a SUV? And without a helmet? Seriously…” I ranted on about stupidity.

I know what you’re thinking if you haven’t stopped reading yet: you think that I need help or no wonder you barely have friends. You’re probably right, but the thing I’ve learned is that most of the time I just say what everyone else was thinking. Does it make it worse that I say it out loud or that you kept it in?