A friend recently said something that made me start thinking about how much we say to each other that is not completely honest or truthful.

In an attempt to avoid hurting someone we hide our true feelings. But in doing so, how can we truly be friends if we aren’t 100% honest and truthful with each other?

About two weeks ago, my husband and I had a discussion about this exact subject and I realized that he is the only person in my life that I am completely honest with. My mom is the next person with whom I am the most honest.

In looking at that, I realized that the more honest and truthful I am with a person, the closer my connection is with that person.

Now that I’m writing this down, it all seems to be common sense, but it’s something I’ve just now really started to think about.

I have so many friends and family members with whom I would like to say are close, but they really aren’t unless I can be truthful with, and around, them. And with many, I feel like I can’t be truthful because we aren’t close enough.

Now that I’ve said that, it makes me wonder which comes first. The truthfulness or the closeness? Or both? It seems like they are intrinsically linked. That you can’t have one without the other.

Recently I’ve been wanting to be more honest and truthful with everyone I interact with. Especially to create closer bonds with the people in my life. My friend has noticed this, but has interpreted it as not being more open, but instead as just more disagreeable.

She recently stated something to the effect of whether or not she was really the kind of person that I wanted to be friends with. (Well, actually, it was just in reference to her Twitter feed, but I felt something in the tone of her reply that I think still applies in the general sense.)

The answer is yes. But I don’t think we can be friends on the level I would like.

I hadn’t thought about it much until she mentioned it, but I’m starting to wonder if we have been tip toeing around each other so much that our true selves are too different to continue to grow any closer as friends.

I wish it wasn’t the case, but I think that maybe I shouldn’t push the matter and just keep our friendship at a “superficial” level.

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Updated to add a clarification that I thought needed to be added to be truthful to my readers, specifically to the friend I refer to, considering this post is about honesty and truthfulness.

I’ve been writing a lot of fiction lately (well, a lot for me) and I’ve been realizing that I prefer to write in longhand rather than on the computer.

Writing on the computer is nice because that’s ultimately where I want my story to end up, so if I write it on the computer I don’t have to later transcribe it. But, writing on the computer makes it much easier to go back and edit things. That may sound like a good thing, but for me it’s the kiss of death.

When using a word processor I find myself just writing the gist of things rather than what I really want to say, telling myself that I can easily go back later and fill in the details. But that’s the thing, I never go back, so sections of my story are anemic. Sure, I could fix that in a second draft, but by then it’s likely that I will have forgotten the ideas and feelings I originally wanted to evoke. Also, if the reason I put off sections is because I found them too boring to write, then they are likely too boring to read and they should have been cut out in the first place. The problem is that sometimes those scenes are pivotal to other later action and I end up not knowing how to fix it when editing. I don’t want to excise the stuff, but I don’t know how to make it exciting. When I write longhand, I get it all out right then and there. I have to. There’s no room to squeeze it in later like there is on a computer. And if it’s too boring a read at that moment I have to find a way to fix it, at that moment.

I also like the freedom pen and paper allows me. I’m not tied to the computer. I can sit wherever I like. One of these days, when it’s nice, I really want to get outside and do some writing. I think that would be really nice. I always seem to get the best ideas when I’m sitting outside.

I also just love using pen and paper. I don’t know what it is about the feel of paper under hand, but it makes writing so much easier. The words just flow out of me, whereas when I sit down in front of a computer I immediately feel blocked.

Anyone else feel the same way as I do?

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Oh… Sitting here writing this while husband watches TV, I just realized another benefit of using paper: You don’t get dirty looks for typing too loudly.

A few days ago I went out to do some chores, grocery shopping, running to the library, etc., and I drove past a local motel. This motel is infamous for renting rooms by the hour.

Turning into the parking lot was a BMW followed by a Lexus.

Now I can think of a couple perfectly good reasons for why people with these types of cars would be turning into this motel’s parking lot, however, the one that stands out in my mind is that they are probably having an affair. They drive to this rundown place because it’s somewhere they can go where they won’t be seen by anyone they know. Problem with that is they stand out to people they don’t know, like me.

But now here’s the real question…

What does that say about me when there are other reasons they might go there (perhaps they are the owners of the motel and they choose to spend their money on cars rather than motel upkeep, or they aren’t from around here and chose this motel because they were uninformed when picking a place to stay), but I choose to think they are having an affair? **Ponders**