Epiphany at Eight

We're all taught from a very young age that if you have to be "sneaky," you probably shouldn't be doing whatever it is that is making you "sneaky." More specifically, sneaking around is bad. And so is stealing, for that matter. Stealing is a very bad offense. Stealing is one of those topics that is black and white. You either steal or you don't steal. You're either a bad person or a good person. But sometimes there's the grey in-between where everything gets blurry like my contacts as I write this. And sometimes it's these grey areas that make you question who you are as a person.

My mother has trained me to be a good child from the beginning of time. I left for the middle school bus at 7:38am every morning starting in fourth grade. What fourth grader wants to be up before the birds? No fourth graders that I know, but I sucked it up and rode the bus. That's the price I paid for an education at an arts school. 


It was on these cranky good-morning-just-kidding-I-hate-being-awake mornings that my mother instilled the belief into my brain and my book of morals that all people should be treated equal. I would flounce out of the house - as rough as those mornings were, they don't even begin to compare to high school, hence I had enough energy to flounce - and down the street with a kiss and a hug and an "I love you!" for my mother, a hasty "See ya!" for my siblings, and enough naïveté to believe that the world would end if I missed the bus. My mom would call after me as I trudged down the street five whole houses, "Be nice to everyone!" I always humored her, saying, "Yes, Mom. I will, Mom. Okay, Mom." It was one of those things where I just nodded, smiled, and waved, trying to avoid tripping over the wandering neighborhood cat.

Having this phrase ingrained in my head was convenient. I treated everyone with respect, including those I didn't like. Especially those who weren't nice to me; they got a special little smile, the kind where you know the person is just tolerating your behavior. But I was not discriminatory in the treatment of others.

I continued to be the rule-abiding, law-making overachiever that I was. Everything was black or white. Good or bad. Clean or dirty. My simple little ideas were not tried until the fatal trip to Sam's Club.

I had a best friend once upon a time. She was a wild child. Her sister was constantly in trouble with the school system, her oldest brother knocked up his girlfriend, her other brother was never around, and she was the baby. You could say she didn't really adhere to the rules that I worshipped. 

Regardless of our differences, I lived at her house. We spent hours together before dance doing homework, our hair, building forts, playing with our American Girl dolls, eating chocolate covered pretzels or ginger snaps, rearranging the toys in her living room. Her toys were my toys, her drama was my drama, and her mother was my mother. Where I was quiet, she was rambunctious, troublesome, dramatic, and busy. Where I was bent on rules, she was bent on breaking them. I didn't really see any of this to be a problem; after all, don't opposites attract? Out different personalities completed the friendship.

It was a fall day when we took the trip to Sam's Club. I never went there unless it was with her; her mom ran a daycare center out of their house and had to buy gallons of milk every week, whereas my family used up a gallon of milk in two weeks. We entered the store, grabbing the big carts and dumping them on our moms, deciding instead to run around and look at everything possible. 

We had been in the store for a little over an hour when she motioned me over to the candy aisle. Sitting there, on the shelf, was an open box of gum balls. They were just sitting there, bag ripped open, waiting for someone to pick them up and walk off with them. And just who would do that? My best friend of course. She urged me to take the gum balls, but I refused; in my black and white world, taking something that isn't yours - unless it is a sibling's, in which case all bets are off - is bad. Dirty. Not right. Mean. It could get you in trouble. Did this stop her? Of course not. Did it stop me? Of course it did. There was no way I was taking those gum balls, whether they were an accidental free-for-all or not. 

My best friend was not to be swayed. She looked at me like I was nuts, questioning again and again, "Why not? Nobody will know." There was no way my perfect, overly-moral and overly-conscientious brain could handle the idea of stealing, nevertheless in a huge store, in public, with cameras everywhere. I couldn't handle it. I ended up leaving the aisle, walking back to the safety of my mother's side. My mother knew something was up; after we left the store and were driving home, my mom flat-out asked, "Did she steal something?" I blushed, ashamed, and coughed out a meager "Yes." Now, ten years later, I still remember that incident. While it didn't determine our friendship, it was added to a list of problems with our relationship, which eventually ended. Catty dance mom talk turned into harsh feelings toward one another, which was in turn fueled by failed play dates and new friends. The grey matter was the area of questioning behind our friendship. Should we really be friends? Is this a good relationship for us? At age eight we - meaning our parents - were contemplating the importance of this friendship. Were there issues regarding ethics? It turned out to be black and white soon enough: yes ma'am. Staying true to my own beliefs kept me grounded, and I wasn't about to give all my beliefs up for one friend. It looks like the subtle reminders of my childhood - do your best, only say nice words - and the not-so subtle reminders of my mother hollering down the street, "Be nice to everyone!" were enough to secure my ideas of what was important to me in life, and especially in friendships.