August 27, 2008

• Humble Pie etc.

  So time to eat my words. If you read my blog a couple of entries ago about people who suck up your drama, I was pretty unkind about ‘crap lasagna’ and people who dropped by and offered to do stuff.

  I eat every one of those words.

  At current count, I have, in my freezer:

  • 3 lasagnas
  • 1 tuna casserole
  • 1 chorizo pasta bake
  • 1 cassoulet
  • 1 quiche.

  Other things:

  • I also have a collection of mad hats from friends who can just ‘whip things up’.
  • My children have been ferried to school – there and back, taken to Brownies and other extracurricular activities. No request necessary.
  • I have a top of the line juicer that a friend ‘lent’ me until I ‘don’t want it anymore’.

  These things are all from friends or acquaintances who have lives, children of their own, jobs to go to and many other things they could be doing besides helping me out. They blow me away.

  However, this isn’t about them. This is about one particular woman who was the target of that mean-spirited blog. She isn’t a friend. She was barely an acquaintance (her husband and mine ride the same train to work and like each other). I have described her to my friends as ‘mad as a cut snake’. She is overbearing, gossipy, talkative to the point of verbal diarrhea, pushy and completely thick skinned. I avoid her whenever possible. I have been known to hide in my car when I saw her walk by, and duck into public restrooms when I saw her approach.

  And yet, the minute she heard I was in strife, she has managed to supply my family with Jamie Oliver quality meals – three at a time. She has offered to take me to radiation. she drops by with her bags full of meals, (included fully prepared vegetable side dishes), chats for 10 minutes — and leaves. She brushes off all thanks, and gets back into her car and back to her 3 children family, where she has, I am sure, her own issues and chores to deal with.

  The reason she is doing this? Because (and this shames me mightily) I once had her over with her family for a BBQ because I felt sorry for her. She had a great time. She tells everyone she had a great time. I think she had a great time because no one has ever invited her anywhere, and she was so pleased to be included.  And I never ever asked her back. Ever.

  Because all my friends bagged me endlessly for it. How’s that for being a wonderful human being?

  I must point out, she has insulted one friend, called the parking control officer on another and managed to scare the crap out of another’s kid. As I said, she is slightly if not totally twisted in some sort of mood disorder kind of way. Still, I am not so sure I wasn’t using that as an excuse to maintain my so-called head honcho status amongst my cronies. How pathetic. How weak. How despicable of me.

  Dammit, if I am going to learn anything from this cancer journey I am on — I am going to learn not to be such an arrogant ass.

  I am not Queen of the Neighbourhood.

  I am not judge and jury of who is ‘appropriate’ and who isn’t.

  I am not the Cool Kid in School.

  Who the hell do I think I am?

  So I’ve reversed my position. If people are sucking up my drama — so be it. They are entitled to at this point. There have been times in the past month where I was weeping at the point of having to cook my family a meal, I was so tired and nauseous. And then, at the door, would appear this woman with food, and a huge weight was lifted. That sort of kindness cannot be underestimated. In my arrogance, and in my assurance that I can handle everything all the time all by myself – I was doing just that.

  What a self-centred bitch I can be. How cynical to assume that everyone does things just to make themselves feel better. Maybe there are people who are just nice and kind and sweet — crazy or not. Okay, I am not one of them. But it’s illuminating to this particular cynic that there might be.

  So apologies to all. And apologies especially to YOU, Crazy-Mad-Snake-Woman.

   

   

  • 6:34 pm
  • 11 Comments