Hate?

  What is it to hate someone?

  Is it to merely dislike them?  To look in disgust at the way they dress, or the way they walk or talk?  To continually become distressed as they approach you for conversation because she's always awkward in a conversations and his/her continual and predictable convulsions are a constant distraction that simply make you want to blurt out, "STOP TAPPING YOUR NAILS!!" Or, "WHY ARE YOU CHATTERING YOUR TEETH?!" This going on and on and on, so that small amounts of irritation are stacked one on top of the other until it overflows?  You can't think about anything other than shutting him/her up!  For certain you know you must get rid of her once and for all so that you don't ever have to endure another "intellectual" and "stimulating" conversation on their intestinal movements, or another so called pleasant conversation about their cat who just passed away, making you want to feel sorry for them except that they keep interrupting you to say another sad and depressing thing about it, then go on and on in JOKES about the damn feline, finally ending with how he/she was so much better off without the cat anyway!  These things you so tire of that you organize a plan in your head, so cunning, so sly, so perfect that you bide your time in executing it, to execute him/her.
  Is that what it is to hate someone?

  Or is it a single thing they did?  So that whenever you hear their voice, all you can think about is how could they possibly do the deed.  Whether it was divorcing your mother/father, or how that one camping trip you saw him/her slay a deer with a pocketknife, or maybe he/she molested you, tried to rape you, and now the thought of the deed is filling your mind to the brim with simple anger and disgust.  So much so that every waking moment you think of it.  So much so that you can't eat, you can't sleep, you can't think of anything else.  That to end your constant suffering, even though they seem like a good person either overall or in the present, you simply can't ignore the past.  And even though they may be good now doesn't mean they won't turn to it again!  Yes!  You're doing society a favor by eliminating them!  They'd become an arsonist or a serial killer or a rapist!  Yes!  You're doing a charity!  You think this as you take a butcher-knife from the cupboard and grasp it firmly in your hand.  Or maybe it's that pocketknife they used on the deer, as poetic justice.  You go over to the room where they're distracted by the TV and creep up behind them.
  Is that what it is to hate someone?

  Or is it that you love them?  It could be the case that love and hate are the same.  That you love that person so much that you want to save them.  To give them salvation.  That whenever you look at their brown hair and ocean blue eyes, you think of what a jewel he/she is, too great and beautiful for the earthly realm, thinking about her even now, as you take a vial of arsenic and put it in her wine.  Because you love her, and you want so much to know what she'll look like as an angel, or because you want to end their suffering.  To end their troubles.  You always hear them going on about their financial issues, their horrible love life, their suffering to a slow and steady disease or disorder, or their general depression they share with you as you attentively listen.  You always listen!  You always care.  You always try and help them, no matter what.  And to help them now, your obsession with them, you have to get rid of them!  You have to remove the temptation from your life!  Maybe they rejected you before!  Maybe you simply can't have them!  Maybe these facts have driven you so far into madness that every waking moment you think of her you can't help but burst out in fury at how much you love them!  YOU LOVE THEM SO GOD DAMN MUCH THAT YOU CAN'T STAND THE VERY THOUGHT OF BEING AROUND HER BECAUSE YOU'RE SO AFRAID YOU'LL HURT HER!!  EVEN NOW AS YOU HAND THEM THE GLASS YOU THINK TO YOURSELF HOW MUCH BETTER YOU'LL BOTH BE OFF DEAD!!... Which is why you saved half the vial for yourself.

  Is that what it is to hate someone?

  Or maybe it is simply that we have attempted to condemn ourselves to a verbally bland life.  That in using such strong words like HATE, you realize you should have saved that word for how much you HATE your spouse, your friend, your enemy, your love, or yourself instead of saying how much you HATE it when the toaster burns one side of the bread and leaves the other barely singed.  How in doing this, actually create a brewing hatred in yourself.  That eventually, the anger and frustration builds up so much that you take a sniper rifle and shoot the CEO of that the manufacturer of the toaster itself.

  Maybe, we shouldn't worry about knowing what hate is, and instead work on how to choose your words carefully, because once you say HATE, the word is in the air.  It creeps into your mind, and slowly but surely builds and builds, growing like cancer, until your head finally splits wide open, and you simply aren't you anymore.