The Truth Will Set You Free

I was reminded about some friends that Louise and I had back when the kids were still very small. Louise thinks his name was Tim and since we can’t remember her name, we will call her Cathy. They had a baby who will be known as “Baby”.

We lived in a small town called Black Diamond and became pretty good friends with this couple; probably because we both had small children. Tim and Cathy were the kind of people that would buy a “fixer upper” house pretty cheap and then do a lot of cosmetic and sometimes not so cosmetic renovations to the house and sell it. Needless to say, they were pretty handy. I think that they had done this a couple of times before, and every time they sold a house they would have a little more for a down payment on the next one. I remember one time when Cathy was over for tea and said that Tim had done the tiling in the kitchen on the back splash and counter top the night before. He told her that since he had done the hard work, she could do the grouting while he was at work. I started to laugh because the grouting is the hardest part in my mind. I think she was going to have a chat later on when he got home.

They were doing the repairs on the house and found that they would have to replace all of the plumbing or all of the electrical, I can’t remember which. It was going to be a very expensive fix though. Two days later, the house caught fire in the middle of the night and Tim, Cathy and the baby had to run through the flames to get out of the house. They lost everything! Well, I guess the insurance policy wasn’t lost. It turned out that having the house burn down was pretty profitable. They got all new furniture, clothing, tools and a pretty big settlement from the insurance company. They moved away shortly after that to Ontario, but we kept in touch through letters.

Just a year or so later, we decided to move back to Ontario and put the house up for sale. I had to move out first for work and Louise sold the house, packed everything up and looked after the kids and the move. I am still paying for that, or at least I should be. One weekend I went to visit Tim and Cathy at their place in Ontario. They were doing the same thing out here, not burning the place down for insurance, but fixing it up to flip it. I called Louise that night and told her about my visit and how Tim and Cathy had bought another shit box of a house and were working on the renovations. I really envied them the ability to do that and how nice it will be to renew our friendship. I guess Louise told someone else, and it got back to Tim and Cathy that I thought their house was a shit box. It was! However, I knew that in a few months it would be beautiful. They never talked to us again and we found out from other friends that they were really offended.

I feel bad about that to this day and wish that I could explain what I meant. I am pretty cautious about what I say about people and their homes now, because you just never know how touchy they will be. I have lost other friends over the years because I told the truth when asked something. I am now pretty careful to just say the “truth” that people want to hear. The truth may set you free, but it is free from the burden of too many friends.