Bugs in the System

Michael is right (generally a safe statement in my experience). Me version 2.0 is off to a bumpy start. Some of the biggest differences in the new version: "be more real -- who I am on the outside is the same as who I am on the inside"; "be less worried about the opinions of others about me".

But I think I need to put some kind of governor on the new features. I don't want the new version to be "be an a**hole"; "make everybody hate me".

I knew that there would be friends who liked Glenn version 1.0 who would not like Glenn version 2.0, though I really couldn't speculate as to which friends those would be. I had lost a couple people on the periphery of my life a while ago, but most of my friends have decided to give the new version a chance.

Today I lost the first of the friends who really meant something to me, and I am grieving. I don't know how many more of these I will have to go through, but I know they will all hurt. I don't want it to get easier, I don't want to get numb to the pain of losing a friendship. I know that the new me will make friends with people who would not have been comfortable with the old me, but friendship isn't fungible.

It doesn't help to know that if they liked the old me and not the new one, then they were only friends with a façade, with the "good Glenn" that I tried to make the world believe I was. I suppose they must also be grieving the loss a person that they thought really existed, who turned out to just be a character in a play. Maybe it's like finding out there is no Santa Claus.

But on to happier things. I have had two magical things happen in my life. Things that only happen in story books but you wish they would happen to you. One is that I've gotten a do-over. Nobody ever really gets a do-over, you know, the one thing you wish you could do all over again, you would do it so differently. I don't know why God decided to give me a do-over, but I'm going to savor it. I hope the rest of you get a do-over, too.

And I got to time-travel into the future. I spent one day living my future, and I think my future will be good. If everything goes south and that future never comes about, I will still at least have spent a day there.

Ah, you all think I'm crazy, don't you? That's alright, Glenn version 2.0 doesn't care what people think about him. Well, maybe a little bit.