I think all the time. I really can’t seem to make my mind shut off. I don’t really know if others have this same problem. It’s just me inside, up here, in my head. My children tell me I over think everything. My ex lover told me I over think everything.

My ex husband basically told me I was too stupid and didn’t think at all.

I know my job requires that I analyze all day long. It’s a thinking profession and I love it. But I get caught up in this behavior. It is toxic. I think it’s innate. So I pick and pull things apart. I pick and pull myself apart. I pick and pull other people apart (hence an ex lover). It’s like taking a sharp scalpel to everything. I want to see how the organism looks on the inside. I want to see the muscle and how it connects to that bone. I want to see the veins and how that blood pumps through them. In my white lab coat I am running numerous science experiments: Why? Why? and more Whys?

It appears I am cruel and relentless in my self examination. It appears I am cruel and relentless in examining others.

My heart knows that these examinations are not a cruel ones. Others are not so convinced. Is this out of my desire to be better? Is this out of a sick desire to point out their human flaws to make myself feel and/or look better? The water is like creek water. Dark, cold and murky.

Amy tells me that sometimes there are just no answers to all my ‘whys’ or ‘how comes’. So in my quest for understanding I look to experts which lead me to more books. My books lead me to words.

During the hike of that Grand Canyon I hiked it out mostly alone. Surrounded by natural beauty, physical pain and my relentless thoughts.

In looking at the canyon walls I think humans can be just as harsh and even more horrid than the elements of nature.

On a few more switch backs on my hike out I start to think about loyalty & I think about betrayal.

These are great themes in life, in movies, in books and of course in the courtroom. What makes a person loyal? Why would someone betray someone else? How to you cultivate loyalty? When is it o.k. to betray?

I think of all the divorces I have handled over the past 10 years. I think of my broken relationships. I take out my clip board and the analyst in me concludes three outcomes to my science experiment.

#1 Loyalty to self which leads to betrayal.

#2 Betrayal out of self indulgence, caprice, vice with no regard to another’s loyalty.

#3 Staying loyal in spite of another’s betrayal or their self indulgence, caprice, vice or disregard for the other’s loyalty.

(Did I lose anyone here? Do I make sense? Or have you concluded I am just plain crazy?)

In any event, I ask you the reader, What is more important? To be loyal to yourself regardless of anything and everything? To be self focused and seek that everything and anything at the expense of another’s loyalty? (Isn’t item 1 and 2 above really the same damn thing only worded differently?) Or do you sacrifice yourself regardless of anything and everything in order to be loyal?

My ex husband screamed and ranted betrayal. I think my ex lover believes I should have self sacrificed myself and others to be loyal to him in spite of a betrayal or perceived betrayal.

In both cases I maintain I was being loyal to my soul. I know my motivation. The divine knows of my motivations. I am breaking out of a tide of clean clorinated pool water.

But then I am wondering if there are real jurors in that box. Self doubt taps me on the shoulder. He is standing there in his khaki pants, that nicely pressed white collar oxford shirt, wearing that smart panama hat. His left hand is shoved deep in his pants pocket and his right hand is flipping and catching that two headed coin.

Pick a side….any side………So what is it?

The head of Loyalty or the head of Betrayal?