Dirty Rotten Scoundrels!!!

The dictionary defines rage as "a feeling of intense anger" and "a state of extreme anger." (Does this sound like a church talk yet?)

The other day Bart told me I rage issues...not because I was yelling or throwing a tantrum or anything like that....but because I told him we needed to change the subject when he mentioned a certain gym that screwed us over many years ago...I think he may be right.

There are two things that engender "feelings of intense anger" in me. One is the sales people at this gym that shall remain nameless...I have a REAL issue with people who can look straight at you and lie without batting an eye. Especially when they're talking to starving students about things that have to do with money.

The second is a supposed "computer repair" place that still has the hard drive to my old laptop...I've given up trying to get it after 3 + years.

Despite my trying to get over these two incidents, every time Bart mentions them I feel...well...rage swell up inside my chest and know that the only way I can make the feeling go away is to change the subject immediately and do my best to focus entirely on the new subject.

Well, yesterday I found out about another incident that may give rise to similar angry feelings for years to come. Somebody stole my sister's bike!!!

Now my sister had been saving up for this bike forever...and she LOVED it. She only bought it a few weeks ago and it was her life. She rode her bike everywhere...to school, to work, to get groceries...okay, so she didn't tell me she takes it grocery shopping, but it wouldn't surprise me! We even had decided to get together every Friday and try out a new bike trail. She was taking a mountain biking class this semester, and was so excited about it.

Do you see how happy she looks in that picture! And then Tuesday morning when she opened her door, the place where she had chained her bike up on the balcony was empty!!! I can just picture the horror/sadness/....okay, I need to stop picturing that because I'm getting even more of those bad feelings.

I've been thinking about it, and it's not the actual bike stealing that is making me mad. It's the part where someone hut my sister so much. For someone to steal something that she had worked so hard for and loved so much just infuriates me. I hate the thought of someone making my sister hurt like that! GRRR!!!!

Now, I know that we're supposed to forgive...and especially with the first two incidents, I think I need to stop ignoring the problem and face it head on so I can get over them...I mean it has literally been years. They should not be evoking so much emotion in me.

I think part of the reason I have held on to these feelings so long is that we don't ever bring it up, so I don't deal with it. There are plenty of things that I have been mad about in the past that I've gotten over. And it's totally true how harboring bad feelings only hurts you. I seriously am so mad I start aching every time I think about these things!!! Te he he.

Anyway, this has been relatively therapeutic, and I promise to work on forgiving these people who I feel have wronged me in the past...but as for the bike thing...if you see someone riding around town in an Orange Raleigh, I too will pay your medical bills if you get hurt tackling them.