Mean Girls

My friends say that I'm "too nice." I used to think this was a compliment until I realized their version of "too nice" translated into "you let people walk all over you." I've worked on this a little bit and now I feel that when they tell me I'm nice, it no longer means "you're a fool, grow a backbone."

But I got to thinking on the way to work about what it means to be nice. There's a gentleman, presumably homeless, that gets on my bus every morning with a bag of food and eats all his food. Nothing fancy- today he had a slice of plain white bread and some juice. But I couldn't help to think when he got on "on here comes the smelly man." And then I thought to myself, Betty, that's just mean. Clearly the man is having rough times and he seems nice enough.

That's when I started breaking apart what it means to be nice. I have nice friends that no one would catagorize as mean, but they are quick to be snide or annoyed when they feel the urge. Then I have friends that are nice to me but can say really mean things. I recently told one of my gfs after she told me how nice I am that the only difference between her and I is that she is unabashed about saying her mean thoughts outloud to whomever will listen. Whereas I keep my mean thoughts inside, because I think they are mean and saying them outloud will make me a mean person.

Aren't I already a mean person by having said thoughts? Oh, she should not be wearing that. Woah, her kids are not attractive, and recently, wow, thank goodness for him he looks like his father. Or, by checking my thoughts, and recognzing that they are less than friendly, am I seperating myself from the Mean Girls? Are mean thoughts a part of human nature and how we express them is the determining factor of what makes us nice or mean? Or is that all BS and I'm really not as nice of a person as I thought?

I'm not sure, but I'll keep debating this in my head. In the meantime, I 'll just follow Thumpers mom's advice (which I think is actually one of the golden rules of life, but Thumper says it so well): If you can't say nothing nice, don't say nothing at all.