Lying Down

We all lie. There are no exceptions, including the most holy, the highest and the lowest. Lying is part of our nature, our need to be accepted and liked. When someone asks us a question that, if truth be told would hurt, we adjust the actual truth a bit, but it's still a lie. And that's the truth! If lies fall under the degree factor such as big lies, white lies, mean lies, kindly lies, spies lies or protective lies, we can find excuses to forgive ourselves. But why lie at all, you say, just tell the truth, you say. We lie to do harm, but we also lie for good. We say that it is always possible to avoid the harsher truths by finding something about the person, that is the truth and relying on it to avoid the actual ugly truth. It's a kind of coloured sort of truth and lie at the same time. Politicians are the top liars and they know how to use lies to make things feel better, or at least for their electors to feel better. Politicians who lie,  can do more than turn mole hills into mountains and vice versa. We know it, and they know it, but we continue to accept it. It's one of the Human Games. Political platforms are made of lies and those who stand on them realize how precarious the planks are, but that's part of the job. It's telling the truth as closely as possible and hoping that it will reign, if not wholly, at least, in part. Political lies however, can be unwound just like Gramma's wool. The media are good unwinders. Then there are doctor lies. "How long have I got?" is never an amount. It is usually, a kind of wiggly lie that can be determined only in the filmy truths it elicits. The teacher lies to  parents, about the kid who is a class brat, but it's a good lie in a way. It's going to do no one a positive turn if the truth isn't cuddled into verbiage that softens the message accompanied by some advice. Then there are the fairy tale lies we tell our children who haven't yet hardened into the marvelous toughened adults we are. I won't get into the religious lies because, as we all know, that's covered by a huge blanket called Faith and who would be as foolish or illegal enough to argue against that? Some lies change people's lives in both good and bad ways. We can even lie to ourselves. We  can  look in a mirror and hurt ourselves by bringing in depression and anger and spite against our own persons. The real  truth about us is that we are wonders of a kind unlike any other creature on earth. No matter what the colour of our skins or what's been put, or not,  into our thoughts, we are miracles. We are looking at something wondrous that has been going on for millions of years. Our genetics go back to the first of our kind and yet, here we are, survivors of everything that has gone before: the dangers and benefits of Nature and Man. We are the result of those times past, to do with ourselves now as we please. How old or rich or smart or strong or popularly pretty we are, our potential is utterly monumental. Our will and survival capacities are in place. And that is no lie!