I maintain

cyn·i·cism (sĭn'ĭ-sĭz'əm) n. An attitude of scornful or jaded negativity, especially a general distrust of the integrity or professed motives of others.

My dad calls me cynical. Maybe, as defined above, I am. But only on occasion. I do not, as he says, have an attitude of scornful negativity and general distrust of the integrity of others. I am actually a generally trusting person. I trust people automatically, unless they do something to betray my trust. If that happens, good luck getting it back.

I do feel there are a lot of stupid people in the world, though. As despair.com puts it so eloquently: there are no stupid questions, but there are a lot of inquisitive idiots. People who are self-righteous and feel they need to ensure everyone is doing what (they think) they're supposed to do...frustrate me. This is not really a good thing, because some of them are friends. And, there are a lot of said people in Provo, in which I reside.

I also dislike people like me - that is, there are traits about myself that I dislike. Having a girlfriend I am so close to and who will tell me the things I need to work on has helped me realize the things I need to work on. I dislike people who are bossy, who tell other people what to do (I do that). I dislike people who always have to be right (I'm working on that really hard, by the way).

Okay - now I am sounding like what I said I'm not: cynical. So I'll end this post. I do not have a negative view of life. In fact, I love life. I like being with people I care about. I'm not cynical. At least, I'm trying not to be.