There are those who gossip and there are those who don’t – and I believe it is a character-defining quality.  Those who gossip lack character.

Now that’s a pretty strong statement for me to make and I feel the need to clarify what I mean when I use the word “gossip.”  Information sharing and gossiping are two very different things.  For the sake of your attention span I won’t give in-depth explanations of how I differentiate between the two – let’s simply say that in my mind gossip is:

• sharing information with the intent to harm;
• sharing information recklessly without concern for the harm it may do;
• sharing non-essential personal information with or without the intent to harm which may do harm because of its sensitive nature;
• spreading indirectly sourced information;
• or spreading or suggesting any information that you do not KNOW to be true.

So back to my previous assertion: Those who gossip lack character.  And “character” is something you ought not to lack.

My friend “Frenemy #1″ is a gossiper.  And though she usually sticks to the facts (though still gossip)- as of late – and probably because she has always had a thing for CC+4 – she’s stretching her “facts” a bit (which btw – that’s a sugar coated way of saying she’s a big fat liar.)  I live my life in a way which dispels her gossip and so I never have to worry about a tarnished reputation.  But this time her gossip impacted someone else in relation to me – CC+4.  And that’s just not cool.  When she drags people I care about into it … well … that’s when I kinda go from lamb to lion.

I don’t even think CC+4 cares about the gossip – he hasn’t mentioned it to me.  Or maybe he’s sparing me from the drama back home??   I don’t know – I only know it’s a small world with FB and I found out anyway.  The gossip?  It was the kind which called the shared religious values of CC+4 and I into question.  And in a predominately religious community such as SLC – that’s some of the worst gossip around.

The thing is – I’m not perfectly polished in that area of my life anyway – and I could stand a little burnishing (score!  WOTD used in a sentence again ) but the things she said were untrue and quite frankly a little malevolent. 

I am going to let this one go.  And while I let this slip under my radar – I’m finally going to let Frenemy #1 aka Mrs. Know slip under the radar as well.  Scott Pete has been encouraging me for a long time to cut her out of my life – and now that I’m like maturing and growing and stuff I think I’m finally ready.  I don’t need people like that in my life.   Especially when there are sooooo many wonderful people out there.