Once upon a time...

...I was angry.
Long ago, in a life far, far away, I would become very angry - so angry, in fact, that I would yell and scream, throw things if there was something to throw and a few times clear a table of its contents.  Then I would cry myself to sleep and wake up with the vague memory of my actions but only a passing idea of any of the words that might have come from my mouth.
And I decided I didn't want to be that person anymore.  I learned how to be a much calmer soul - a better self.  This is not to say that I don't have the ability to be that angry person again if I was to stop being diligent.
It is there.  A great, prehistoric monster lurking in the dark, murky depths of my psyche waiting for me, its prey to sink that low - down, down, down into its lair, into its waiting, gaping, toothy mouth.
There are times, places, and situations in which I feel the water getting colder, darker and hopefully sooner versus later recognize how deep in I've been pulled and can claw my way back into the warmer, clear water I've come to prefer.  The trouble is there are familiar things, places, and people in that murky water.  It is dangerous because I know it there.  It is easy to slip into the familiar surroundings and start behaving in familiar ways.  In that place, far too close to everybody knows my name - my name, but not necessarily me.
"Ay, there's the rub."  To know me then is not to know me now and to know me now is (blessedly) not to know me then.  What of those who have known me both then and now?  Can one persona overcome the other?  In myself, yes, I believe so as I have seen it.  I am not who I was.  In the mind's eye of those who knew me long ago, in a life far, far away...if you have not visited me where the water is warm and clear, please, I assure you, the water is fine.  And if you are content in those murky depths, I beg you please to not try dragging me down to meet you.  I have strove through too many of my lives to overcome what now lurks below.  It is ugly and I do not wish to be that person again.