Love has a fraternal twin named Hate. They don’t look the same, but they’re similar enough because they come from the same place. Maybe they are more like day and night. Love is bright and sunny and makes you happy to get up in the morning. Hate is like night, dark and scary. You need your daylight but you also need a break from it. Bring in the darkness, because you can’t have one without the other.

I’ve recently come out of the shadows, out of the dark, and back into daylight. Having been played and betrayed, I was bitter. I was stuck. Like a car spinning tires in the snow, all I was giving off was smoke and dirt. And it’s funny, because, like a movie where the lead is walking on sunshine, that had been me just days before. It didn’t happen right away, just like a sun sets instead of disappearing.

Hate is a fix, a temporary bandage. It doesn’t make you better, it doesn’t fix anything. But it’s enjoyable in the moment. It’s fun to pick over every flaw so you can feel better about yourself. It does, however, get old fast. I’m quickly asking myself, what’s the point? All that time you spend fuming and hating someone is for nothing because they’ve moved on and you haven’t. Hate is stuck in the past.

I say, move on. Emotional scars are with us. Picking at the scab won’t help things. Let it heal and move on. Overtime you feel nothing. And that’s where I am now. I’ve taken my lumps. I’ve learned my lessons. There’s no going back so you might as well look forward.

None of this is possible without the love of your friends. No man is an island, right? The Beatles said, “all you need is love.” I’d say all we want is love. But, like winter makes us love summer that much more, our enemies can make us appreciate our friends that much more.

James lives in downtown Edmonton and is a researcher at the Alberta Legislature.