Rumors and Gossip

Living in a small town is tough. Everybody seems to know everything about everybody. It's an age group thing though, everybody that's around their 50's knows everybody else thats in that age bracket, and what's going on in their lives. Everybody in high school knows each other, which that's to be expected, and then there's the one's in their 30's and their 20's...some of us get cross pollinated but we still know everything there is to know about our own age group. It's really an unfortunate situation if you are in a relationship to live in a small town. You may think it is a good thing because there are less people for your partner to cheat on you with, however, this is not true since like 90% of people who cheat, do so with somebody they are fairly well acquainted with, and if you are acquainted with your whole town, then technically you have more people to cheat with. A small bracket of people manage to escape the town's scrutiny, but this usually happens right after they get married and have small children in the home, and as soon as they have school aged children, bam! their back in the system and everybody knows what's going on with their life, and how bright or stupid their child is, and how good of a parent they are, etc. etc. etc.
Back the dating phase of small towns... one of the worst things to do, is listen to all the rumors and gossip and become a part of it. It may not directly affect your relationship, and you may not like the person it is about, so you happily pass on the little tidbits that you were privy to. How unfortunate for you, you just seemed your kharmaic fate. I'm really not a big believer in Kharma, but I am a believer in doing unto other as you would have them do unto you. I also believe that you will have to suffer the consequences of your actions too. If you are an untrustworthy rumor-spreader, just be prepared for the day your relationship takes a turn for the not so happy and you become the victim of the insidious rumor mill.
unfortunately gossip is juicy, and whether we spread it or not, we all want to hear it... If you can, though, just take a step back from the gossip for a moment, and think about the person that it is about. Put yourself in the shoes of the young girl who just found out she was pregnant, or the woman who's husband is cheating on her, or the mom who's child is the bully or the dummy in school. I don't mean think about how blessed you are not to have these things happen to you, because that can just be another form of gloating and superiority. I mean, step outside yourself, and try to imagine what it is like in their shoes, if that was your life, if those were your problems, and if the whole town was talking about them. The easiest way to do this is to take your own deepest darkest secret and picture what it would be like for everybody to know it. After that little exercise, do you still feel like passing on that juicy tidbit? I doubt it.