Two in one week! Bird to your mother.

[preraph]

Since I'm pretty much mad at all my friends right now, I'm going to get it off my chest here.

 

I work about a job and a quarter, but mainly at home at least. It's really hard for me to get away from work. It's been 3 years since I got out of town overnight, and my elderly cat nearly had a breakdown then. One of my dogs has fear problems at times. Even the vet lost her when she broke a leash. (I'm now thinking it may all be due to epilepsy). She's mostly sweet to me, but not reliably controllable and has skirmishes with the other dog, probably because the other dog knows something is wrong with her. So I haven't dared travel her yet. She'd bark in a hotel room. She's small but loud. She doesn't like to be picked up, etc. So it's very hard for me to get any kind of vacation going between the dogs and work.

 

(fake names below:)

 

I've known Barb over 30 years. Old roommates, partners in crime. She lives out of town. I haven't seen her in over a decade. She owns her own business that she runs out of her home. Her husband has been chronically ill for the past couple of years. She is bipolar and narcissistic and has an awful lot on her plate. I'd given her an open invitation a couple of months ago that if it all got to be too much, come up here for a break and I'd let her rest while I made phone calls to keep everything going for her.

 

She's very impulsive, never on time, not a good planner. Best to do things at the last minute and just take advantage of her impulsivity. She's very energetic for her age (we're both about 60).

 

She called last week, summoning me. Says she can't come up here but she needs me. Specifically wants me that weekend because the next weekened, her grown son is moving back in, but says if I wait until next weekend it's okay and he can sleep on the couch. I dropped everything and called my clients, told them I couldn't work for a few days, made arrangements for someone to care for my dogs, which wasn't easy and was going to worry me the entire time.

 

Two days later, she's emailing "Can't wait" etc. She'd already found out the son had shown up early, but didn't seem to care. Then the next email an hour later, she's saying I better not come. So she abruptly cancels. I write it off to just being Barb, unable to plan anything, overstressed, too much on her plate. I wasn't happy, but neither was I all that surprised. She emails back 10 minutes later, "Oh, go ahead and come." I told her "Too late, I already contacted my clients for work."

 

Then she writes a longer email and tells me the reason she asked me to come down when she did. A few months ago, she had reminded me it was almost her and her husband's 30th anniversary. He's sick and all. It might be their last, God forbid. I quickly ordered a personalized gift with their names and marriage dates engraved on it and had it mailed directly to her.

 

In the email she told me that at the time she received it months ago, she hadn't fully unwrapped the gift but just barely pulled back a corner and then left it where it sat. So the day she invited me, she had finally unwrapped it and seen the inscription and all and gotten sentimental and that is what motivated her to call me to come down. I think this was supposed to make me feel better. It didn't. It really made me mad. I don't go scrambling around to get someone a gift to have them chunk it aside unopened.

 

Meanwhile, I try to go to the river a couple of times a summer and haven't been able to go yet. I have only skipped one year when my sister was hospitalized and feel I am working for nothing if I don't get to go do this one thing I like to do -- just for a day trip because of the dogs and work.

 

That weekend was the weekend I hoped to find a day to go do that, but then Barb had called, and all that transpired.

 

My local friend, Betty, also a 30-year friend, who I usually have lunch with at least once or twice a month, has never been on this river trip. I really wanted someone to go with me so the drive back wouldn't be as hard (it's 4 hours each way all in one day and I'm on antibiotics for kidney infection). We'd talked about it every now and then and she acted like she'd like to sometime. So I planned to go on Sunday when she was off work and asked her to go with me. She hemmed and hawed, said she had things to do around the house (she lives alone - there's not a thing that couldn't wait). So I could tell she, for whatever reason, wasn't that keen on it. But she likes to go do things and usually she will go do them, so I figured she'd end up going. I usually go myself but just felt not quite up to it alone this time. She says "Let me think about it."

 

So that was Thursday. I figured she'd call me after work on Friday. She didn't. I figured she'd call me on Saturday which is when she does some phone calls anyway. She never called. I tried calling her and she had set her phone where I couldn't even leave a message (land line). By this time, I had hay fever pretty bad and was ready to go to bed. If I was going with or without her, I'd have to go to bed really early. She just left me dangling and never did call. I was in such a bad mood from the friend rudeness over the past week that I just didn't go and the hay fever wore me down too but if I'd gotten out of my house/yard, it probably would have let up.

 

So now I'm just really pissed off and resentful and depressed because the summer has gotten away from me. I am not sure what to do about Betty. At my age, it is nearly impossible to make local real friends to go do things with, so I can't really afford to lose any old friends. So I've pretty much decided to just wait until she really wants to do something and tell her I will and then not answer the phone. Plus I'm going to tell her how rude that was and she's going to act like she didn't know she had to call me back and let me know. By the way, Betty is one of those annoying people who think they're always positive -- and she pulls this.

 

That's my rant. Any thoughts or suggestions would be appreciated. If they were new friends, obviously I'd dump them both. But 30 years is a long time...

[Lisey9]

I'm half your age and I have a hard time making new real friends to do things with!

 

First, I can relate, and completely sympathize with being blown off like that. It sucks when you are the one putting all the thought and effort into a relationship and then are treated that way.

 

From what you've said about Barb, I probably wouldn't bother to confront her on her behavior. But I don't see why you wouldn't give Betty a call and let her know how disappointed you are that she blew you off. I know that's really hard to do...

[preraph]

^ Thanks for the reply. I think you're right. I just know it's going to lead to a big argument when I do speak to her. She was a real weasel for doing that.

[Lisey9]

^ Thanks for the reply. I think you're right. I just know it's going to lead to a big argument when I do speak to her. She was a real weasel for doing that.

 

It's not fun having to have these conversations. People tend to get defensive, and very rarely admit to any wrongdoing or rude/unacceptable behavior.

[CC12]

Your friends are flakes, but you really did cut off your nose to spite your face by not going to this event that was important to you. You could have still gone without your friend, but you chose to stay home and wallow, no offense. You can't blame that on anyone else.

 

Betty never agreed to go with you. She absolutely should have gotten back to you and just told you she didn't want to go. She shouldn't have dodged your phone calls. But you shouldn't have relied on her for this trip. I'd probably give Betty a pass for this one and in the future take her daydreams ("Yeah, it'd be great to go...) with a grain of salt.

 

Barb was an absolute ass to you. Bipolar, narcissistic, "impulsive, never on time, not a good planner." If this is an ongoing pattern, you'd be completely in the right to end the friendship with her. But you seem to kind of expect this behavior from her.

 

It's hard because on one hand, you can say that Barb doesn't know any better. On the other, you can say that it doesn't matter if she knows better or not, because it's still hurtful to you, and that's what matters most.

 

I guess I would say that if you can train yourself to basically not care about her discourtesy, then continue the friendship and just expect that she's going to flake and kind of screw you over at times. This seems like a friendship that would require a lot of management on your part. You manage your expectations, and you manage how much her "plans" might effect your life if/when she flakes.

 

It's like you said, "Best to do things at the last minute and just take advantage of her impulsivity." I have a friend like that, kind of. I never rely on them, always expect them to cancel, and I just assume that if I spend time with this person, anything can happen and I just have to be in the mood to go along with it. If I'm not in the mood for dumbassery, then I don't see them. So I hardly ever spend time with that person, but we're still friends. Not every friend has to be a great friend.

 

Still, though, you'd be completely in the right to end either of these friendships, especially with Barb.

[preraph]

The reason I didn't do the trip by myself is because I wasn't feeling up to it by myself. I was on antibiotics and having hay fever and was just afraid I'd get too tired to do all the driving myself. I almost always do the trip alone but just couldn't this time.

 

Yes, I'm well used to Barb's issues, but I would have thought since she invited me for that specific time she'd have at least tried to get herself together and follow through.

 

I'm really more mad at Betty because she's a very organized person and so I know everything she did was on purpose and really taking a swipe at me. I'm not mad she didn't go, just mad she chose to leave me dangling like that. Probably because she is so "positive" that she doesn't like to say no. Thanks for your thoughts!

[Lisey9]

 

I'm really more mad at Betty because she's a very organized person and so I know everything she did was on purpose and really taking a swipe at me. I'm not mad she didn't go, just mad she chose to leave me dangling like that. Probably because she is so "positive" that she doesn't like to say no. Thanks for your thoughts!

I've known people like this. It's really frustrating because they don't understand that we all would be so much happier with a "No, not this time" than being left hanging because they think we will be angry or devastated or whatever if they just tell us no. The world will not end if they tell someone NO!!!