“There’s two sides to every story.” 

That’s what my attorney-friend always says when I begin telling him a tale.

 “YES, two sides” I tease….”mine which is the truth and the other side which is either grossly exaggerated or just a plain ole lie.”

And, I AM teasin’ when I say that.  

I realize that most times, there ARE two sides of the same tale; two different takes on the same happening.

But have you ever been in a situation when there’s really only one side?

When you’ve been wrongly accused of something?

Totally wrongly accused?

I mean, there’s not even a shred-of-a-thread of truth in what’s been said?

I have, and it really sucks.

I’m pretty sure my attorney-friend would argue that still there’s another side but I’m wondering, when you KNOW beyond any reason that there’s ZERO truth in what you’ve been accused of then, there’s just NO other side. 

Right?

I’m not talkin’ when something you say gets taken out of context and kinda ends up a little more interesting than what you REALLY said…..

I’m talkin’ when it just DIDN’T happen.

It just didn’t.

If you have, then you know the frustration that it brings.

I’ve had to talk my way outta things I’ve said and explain things I didn’t mean to say but that wasn’t the case.

It was many, I mean MANY years ago but it was so unjust and hurt so bad that I never forgot it.

It came to me in the form of a letter the old-fashioned way…..in the mail, from a woman I considered my friend.

I was tongue-lashed, chastised, chewed-out, given a piece of her mind and just plain received HELL about something I honestly had NOTHING to do with. 

NOTHING.

Not even a teeny, bit.

She accused me of meddling, manipulating and actually being responsible for the divorce of someone we were both very close to.

She lectured that I should have done everything in my power to talk her out of it.

But, in truth, this friend had confided in me years before she actually did it that one day a divorce would happen.

We spoke on the phone on a regular basis but I never encouraged HER decision about divorce.  

Divorcing was one of the worst experiences of my life and I’d never wish that kind of horrid stress on anyone, especially my friend.

But she knew whatever HER decision, I was there to support her and all I cared about was her happiness.

There was nothing else to say.

The letter hurt real bad.

It hurt because until the day I received it, I thought the woman who sent it was a pretty good friend of mine.

I liked her real well.

She was clever and fun and we shared some great times laughing and just enjoying the time of life we were in.

But after I read what she accused me of and how she wrote it, and then warning me that IF I shared it with the person it was about, then that meant I was never really her friend AND, in no way should I try to respond to her because she wanted nothing to do with me and would just ignore anything from me including ripping-up and tossing my attempt at writing to her.

So….. her game, her rules.  

I got falsely accused and was deemed guilty without even being able to explain or defend myself.

Guilty!

I obviously never got over it, here I am all these years later relaying it to you, my reader friends.

I can’t help but think that I’m not the only person that this has happened to and then I think what about people in jail who are really innocent?  

That’s gotta happen too.

How horrible is that?

It’s a really sucky feeling being innocent but judged as guilty.

I can only guess that the woman who wrote and sent that letter thought she had a right to let loose on me.

But when is that kind of behavior OK?

Who put her in charge and more to the point…..WHO ASKED HER?  

And because it was completely untrue, where did her false information come from?

Did she simply assume?

I don’t know.

Although, HAD any of it been even a little bit true, it really wasn’t any of her business or her place to lecture me anyways.  

But, as I’ve said, more than once…..it didn’t happen.

So, what did I do?

First I cried…..pretty hard.

Her words to me were cruel and untrue and I knew we’d no longer be friends.

Because I knew her well enough to know that she meant what she said about not reading anything I wrote, I knew attempting to respond would get me nowhere but her trash can.

But, I’ll be damned if she was gonna tell me what I could and couldn’t do with her nasty letter and accusation.

I sent her entire letter to the person she warned me not to alert about it.

Call it whatever you want, that’s what I did.

She’d already declared us non-friends.

SHE decided if I dare do what she told me NOT to do then that meant I was never really her friend.

ANOTHER UNTRUTH.

I REALLY liked her…..once.

And that’s how it went.

Everything ended with her letter. 

Kinda like she died.

I was left with the memory of her nasty, accusatory letter.

It hurt and for some time it frustrated me horribly.

I was deemed guilty for something I REALLY didn’t do but, it didn’t matter…..she had appointed herself judge and jury.

 A few years after this happened, something horrible happened in her life.

I heard about it through friends.

I felt sorry and sad for her.

  

So bad I wanted to contact her and give her my support.

But her nasty words were branded on my brain….I never forgot.

In truth, I had no business thinking of communicating with her at such a horrible time in her life and I don’t think hearing from me was anything she would have wanted anyways.

 

We were no longer friends.

Had we ever been, really?  

Would a friend do that?

Wouldn’t a friend have maybe brought it up in a conversation?

Questioned it?

Would a REAL friend, assess a situation with obviously the wrong facts, then make her own decision about it and finally slap you in the face with her nasty letter and evil words?

I know the answer.

My husband always says that NASTY people are not HAPPY people and her letter was full of nasty.

So NO, we were never really friends.

And after she showed that ugly side of herself, I wouldn’t have wanted to be friends with her anyways.

So I lost someone I thought had been my friend but wasn’t.

Her? 

She lost a real friend.

Once again, I’m reminded to try to pull something good out of everything bad.

I think my good would be to not rush to judgement and try to remember that what other people do is really none of my business.

And, THINKING something is true doesn’t make it fact.

As a final thought…..screw it!

I’ve carried this around long enough.