It was your birthday not too long ago. I got home tired today. Thought i'd collapse onto my bed and fall asleep straightaway. But i couldn't sleep. For some strange reason, i started thinking about what i wrote in your card. I guess i was just trying to be politically correct. After all, i don't know u well at all. I wanted to bless you, so i wrote general things i could think of on the spur of the moment. But my style is not to write generic comments and birthday wishes. What i really wanted to write was this:

Year after year on your christmas cards, i write the same thing. I express regret for a whole year that passed without our getting to know each other even a little better. I also say how nice it would be if the following year could be different. I'd still say that in this card. But somehow things have been marred between us. Which is strange, considering we're kind of just acquaintances. I guess the problem lies with me then. I often lie in bed thinking about what transpired between us that night. Technically, it was a monologue. Kind of. I don't think you even took in my explanation. All i knew was, i was being bombarded with all sorts of accusations which made my soul scream out "UNTRUE!" I felt hurt, and wronged. And yet, i had no right to expect you to believe in me, because u didnt really know me. Frankly, i got into this mess partly because i stood up for a friend i believed in. I stood up for her because i believed in her character and i knew she was not capable of what you and others accused her of. But how come no one stands up for me? Yes, i understand you didn't experience things firsthand, so perhaps you didn't really know the reality of things. But i really did think it was unfair of you to believe everything you were told, especially when we all know words get twisted, knowingly or unknowingly, in conversations. Afterall, we can't always relay the exact same words we hear. It was even more unfair to me, for you to hurl accusations, based on secondhand accounts, at me. I think, at the end of the day, there must be something wrong with the testimony i'm giving others. There must be. Why else would a friend of ten years not stand up for me and defend my character, and even choose to think the worst of me? Why else also, would you deem it fit to accuse me of wrongdoing? Considering that we are merely acquaintances, and that our interaction is sparse and limited to what little we see of each other in church, i must be behaving in a way that gives people the idea that i am what you say. One who knew me chose to believe the worst. Another knew me not, and also chose the same. I must be a bad testimony.

I don't know why this bothers me so. It haunts me, it really does. Every time i see you, it makes me wonder. Have i really gone so wrong that my character counts for nothing and warrants no defence from wrongs? Had to get out of bed, and get this off my chest. Perhaps i really need to reflect on myself.