Whose Side are You On?

I’d like to speak a little about Karen and me. I’ve struggled for five years on how to put this into a blog post without making it seem like I’m giving advice or criticizing others. I’m not sure I’ve achieved that even now, but it’s something I want to speak about. I hope my thoughts are cohesive, because I’m going to post this version of the blog post, no matter what.

I’ve struggled with some of the things I want to say so much that I’ve re-written this blog post a dozen times or more, including tonight, when I wrote it from scratch, yet again. And I’ve already decided to leave much of what I’ve written in past versions for other posts.

Where to start? Okay. I guess that I want to start with that I know, which is that I know with absolute certainty that Karen was on my side.

Karen knew how to be on somebody’s side, and how to make them actually feel that this was true. Plenty of people will act like they are on your side, and then stab you in the back later, and people tend to keep this in mind when forming relationships, whether professional or personal.

Professionally, Karen actively worked to mentor the people around her, and provided constructive criticism in ways that made people understand that she wanted to help lift them up, not to tear them down. When she reached out to help, people took it to heart, and her input helped them evolve. She wanted to help them shine.

Imagine the difference between learning about your shortcomings from a person who wants or expects you to fail, and from somebody that you know without a doubt will fight tooth and nail to help you succeed, because they are on your side. Karen was willing to be on your side, and knew how to make people feel that truth.

Karen took great pride in seeing her guidance help others to succeed. She always thought about others. It seemed strange to me at the time, but she would call them her “baby birds” and would laugh in joy when they succeeded. We were all her baby birds, and it doesn’t seem so strange to admit it now.

It’s easy to be on somebody’s side when they are right. But even when I was wrong, she was on my side. In mixed company she’d never say a single word that might take anything away from me, no matter how foolish I was acting at the time.

Yet later, when we were alone, she might say all kinds of stuff (that I’m not about to share here), but that was when we were away from all others. And even then, she was still on my side, helping me to be a better person. For some reason, I was willing to accept that input from her. I look back fondly at her telling me what a “human being” might have done in a situation I had been in (where I had acted differently). Yes, she helped me be a better human.

Not only was Karen on my side, she let me know this regularly. Sometimes I’d drive to work and find a note in the car, where she’d tell me how much she loved and appreciated me.

When I loaded the dishwasher wrong she’d tell me that she appreciated the effort, and really meant it. And there were a lot of those, because I still don’t know how to load the dishwasher correctly. I’m a guy after all.

I also remember many occasions where we were out at the grocery store and saw another couple arguing about something stupid, and she’d whisper in my ear that she was grateful that I never treated her this way, and thanked me for being who I was.

She did similar things for others in her circle of influence. She would always recognize people for their successes, write notes and post them to their computers, and took the time to recognize them personally when they shined. She’d do everything she could to support the people around her.

Karen knew how to be on somebody’s side. I felt it, her friends felt it, and the people she mentored felt it.

It can be a struggle to manage life. Karen and I faced many struggles, but we always faced them together. I can’t imagine how we would have dealt with half the things we did if we weren’t on the same side.

It’s hard for people to gain trust, but Karen seemed to do so almost effortlessly. I think it had a lot to do with how she would speak to people. She would never speak to somebody in a way that she’d object to if a stranger spoke to them. This was true under even the worst of circumstances.

I’ve seen people speaking to their family, spouse, or friends in a way that would appall them if a stranger said the same words in the same way. They say things that would start fights if a stranger said it. But Karen never spoke as such.

I’m grateful that Karen always treated me the way she did, that we treated each other as we did. There are many others that feel the same way about Karen as I do. She knew how to treat the world around her. I’m forever grateful she was on our side.