Dealing with Mean People

I have been working on accepting the fact that sometimes people are mean. I am pretty sure it could actually be categorized as a fact of life. This is something that I have been trying to deal with since kindergarten when a girl in class stepped in my square foot garden of dandelions and buttercups. (Incidentally, I had asked her politely not to. I hit her, trying to defend my creation. She told the teacher and I got in trouble for not sharing.)

Anyway, I still have a hard time with this concept of mean people. I suppose everyone has a motivation of some sort, but I don't know what those motivations are so to me it just seems mean. When I was little, and someone did something mean to me, I would react in the same way any mature six year old would--cry and get my daddy. Lately that tactic hasn't been working, partially due to the fact that he is in Michigan and I am in Illinois, but also due to the fact that I am (dare I say it) no longer six years old.

I think that the excessive amount of hormones is not helping. These days my coping tactic has been to call someone, tell them what happened and fall into a pathetic universal crisis that includes "Why does the world have mean people," "Why is there no solution," and "Why don't we keep chocolate in the house???" Then I go find something that will make me happy. Today, this makes me happy.