I used to think you were mean

"I used to be afraid of you" is a sentence I've heard many times in my life. I've always fought insecurity with sarcasm. I thought for today's #blogeverydayinmay topic (which is something someone has said to you that you will never forget) that this was an appropriate response.  The first instance of this has always stood out in my mind in particular. Junior year of high school, I sat behind a girl named Margo. She was (still is) absolutely gorgeous, played on the soccer team, and had tons of friends.  She was a "popular" girl, and therefore I assumed she didn't like me.  After an entire year of Honors US History where we'd started to talk here and there, she turned around one day and said those words "I used to be afraid of you!" I was shocked. It was supposed to be the other way around!  She was popular, I was just a lowly non-athlete. The experience really showed me 1. That how I view myself is usually wrong and 2. That I should be a little less sarcastic because it comes off as mean.

I wish I could say I learned my lesson and now I'm not sarcastic, but it's permanently ingrained in my personality. You can probably blame my father.  A former employer told me to "never lose my acerbic wit" so I'm going to go with it.  But I would like to say for anyone who is, or used to be afraid of me, I'm actually pretty nice once you get to know me.  I get joy out of doing things for other people. Making someone else happy makes me happy. So there.