2-Faced

Growing up in a small, rural area where my father's side of the family traces back many generations, practically everyone knows who I am when I say I'm "Dad's" daughter. That's not to say that I know everyone in the area, but those with whom I have interacted tend to think fondly of myself and my family and I of them. I have many friends in this community including many fishermen.

When I became intertwined in the fishing community, I began learning alternate identities of well-esteemed townsfolk. My innocent respect for several fishermen was turned upside-down when I learned of not-so-respectable acts that they have committed on the water. This wasn't easy for me to swallow, as a girl who tends to believe in the good in people.

For example, I heard through the grapevine that someone with whom I regularly have amiable conversations is known to have cut a significant number of buoys on multiple occasions upon losing his temper. Every lobsterman loses his/her patience at some point, but cutting traps is the most disrespectful act that one can commit around here. It isn't much better than spitting in someone's face. Actually, it's worse because not only are you disrespecting them, but you're costing them money too.

As with most predicaments in my life, I went to my Dad with this paradox. How could the fishermen who are so fatherly and kind to me on land be such hellians on the sea? My father explained in his usual soothing and reasonable way how some fishermen are in fact respectable members of this community, but when they get irritated at work on the water that they can be short-of-temper and very reactive. When lobstermen loose their patience on the water, bad things can happen. This reminded me of "Two-Face" in Batman, who's good or ill will depends on the flip of a two-headed coin.

This isn't to say that I am no longer friends with those "two-faced" individuals. I believe that, regardless of the ugly rumors one may hear about a person, I should make my own judgements based on my personal interaction with them. However, my new perspective opened my eyes to the fact that a person can be much more complicated than they first appear.