Variation on the False Face.

I suffer a bit if I’ve said something harsh to somebody. It worries me that I might have hurt their feelings, even if I’ve only stated a truth I thought had to be stated. I can have a knot in my stomach for several days afterwards.

A psychologist once told me I shouldn’t think that way because it’s arrogant. It presumes that the person gives a damn about what I said, and I have no right to make such a presumption. Maybe, but I once told my daughter I was expecting a visit from a woman in America. She told me I should be careful because I can come across as ‘awfully cold,’ and a sensitive person could easily get hurt.

I’m not awfully cold – quite the opposite, really. But it seems that the way I feel on the inside is often at variance with the way I appear on the outside. I suppose it’s a curiously ironic – and maybe even perverse – variation on Lady Macbeth’s command:

False face must hide what the false heart doth know.