I Make Shit Up

In speaking with a pal recently I discovered something about myself that I had either not known before or didn’t want to admit. I make shit up – Don’t Get Me Started!

We were talking about someone we both knew but had not been in contact with for years. I said, “She got married, had a child and I think she’s out of the show business now and being a stay at home mom.” As soon as the words came from my mouth I realized that most of the statement had no basis in actual fact. Well, none that I could point to anyway. I do remember an email from her at one point telling me she had gotten engaged and I kind of remember the pregnancy thing from someone else telling me I think but the whole stay at home mom business I know I just completely made up on my own. So after I thought about it, I just said to my friend, “But I don’t know because I make shit up!” I don’t know why I do it but as I reviewed many of the things I’ve told people, I discovered that a lot of it is a work of fiction rather than based in reality.

I truly don’t think that I do it from a malicious place in my heart, I think I do it more to make the story more interesting or because it’s what I think should or would happen. Still, I know it doesn’t make it right. But on the other hand, it’s more interesting than saying, “I don’t know.”

My spouse is always telling me that I’m never allowed to repeat anything he says because of the inaccurate way I repeat what he says. The reason for this is that if you told me something and then put a gun to my head I couldn’t repeat it exactly as you said even with my life hanging in the balance. It’s because I don’t just take in the words you’re telling me, I’m also taking in your body language and your tone and mostly I’m allowing how it hits me emotionally to reshape what you said in my mind. If you are standing there with your hands on your hips, rolling your eyes and saying, “I thought it was a great idea you had to put that shirt with those pants.” And someone asks me what you said, most likely I’ll say you said, “God, you don’t know how to dress, you have awful taste for putting that shirt and pants together.” I know, it may not make any sense to you but somewhere in my head it does.

I like to say that we all have our own mental illnesses it’s just that some of us have it more in check than some of the rest of us. This is definitely one of my mental illnesses. And yet if you examine the two statements above I’ll stand by mine. You see the original statement was just that, a statement. The way I interpreted it takes in the whole body language and makes it more interesting. Yes, I realize this is all rationalization but remember that whole business about mental illness? Voila – there you have it.  

I could sit here and make up a hundred excuses as to why I do what I do but I think by now you must realize that if I were to do that I would most likely once again be making shit up. So I guess what this is more than anything else is a sort of disclaimer that when you read my blog you may find that some of it is the truth, some of it is truth has been embellished and some of it is just a fairy’s tale! I make shit up – Don’t Get Me Started!

Read More Scott @ www.somelikeitscott.com