Pretend you don’t see it
When you see something like that, when you see someone exposed like that, it’s an element of voyeurism which is thrilling through its anonymity. The problem arises when you come to the conclusion that it’s not so anonymous. Not only is there a real person behind the pained words, but it’s someone you know. That’s when their pain becomes your embarrassment, your awkwardness. Your conversations will always have that other image as a subtext, even though you would never dare humiliate them by telling them you know. You begin to wish you didn’t see it. You begin to wonder what it is like for priests in small parishes who hear confessions of their acquaintances. Do they subconsciously treat people differently after they hear the dark things that lie in the bowels of the brain? Would they ever mention it outside of the confessional?
Probably not, and even though the confession wasn’t to me (or perhaps especially since it wasn’t to me), I shall pretend I didn’t read it.
“Nakedness is often seen but never noticed.”