I was hosting someone, and asked them a very simple thing. "I need to give a cat a bath. Would you help out by doing some dishes?" And of course they said yes. It's not like I asked them to give a bath to a cat with a front paw full of needles, no that was my job.
I came back to the kitchen over an hour later to find all the dishes...still in the sink. I was furious. It's not like I asked my guest to remake a bed or run a malware/virus check and purge onto my computer. He'd been there three days already and I'd fallen into my mother's old trap, sorry Mom. I'd let him NOT LIFT A GORRAM FINGER. Well, okay, I let him make his own tea, but that's more the fact that everyone likes their tea/hot beverage of choice differently.
I came back to the kitchen over an hour later to find all the dishes...still in the sink. I was furious. It's not like I asked my guest to remake a bed or run a malware/virus check and purge onto my computer. He'd been there three days already and I'd fallen into my mother's old trap, sorry Mom. I'd let him NOT LIFT A GORRAM FINGER. Well, okay, I let him make his own tea, but that's more the fact that everyone likes their tea/hot beverage of choice differently.
So I go into the (trashed!) living room and there he is. Reading. READING! I confront him, and he said he did do dishes! HAH! So we went back into the kitchen and he points out three small plates. Three small plates. In an hour?! No, he says. He just wanted to finish his book, and anyways, they're my dishes.
Sure, I say to him. Sure, there are a few in there that are mine, but look, there's all SEVEN mugs you used for THE SAME TEA, and look, you cooked last night because you wanted something you could cook and I could not, and don't forget who used two oven bowls for his pasta the day before instead of reusing the one you'd just eaten out of, and just LOOK at this room, and the other one!
Sure, I say to him. Sure, there are a few in there that are mine, but look, there's all SEVEN mugs you used for THE SAME TEA, and look, you cooked last night because you wanted something you could cook and I could not, and don't forget who used two oven bowls for his pasta the day before instead of reusing the one you'd just eaten out of, and just LOOK at this room, and the other one!
It was at that point, as I nearly-scream at him on the same subject for the second time, hear more promises most likely just as empty as the first set...
This was going nowhere. I loved him, but the things he did...or rather that he didn't do. I left the ability to be comfortable in my own mess and filth behind at a school with people I loved but teachers and staff that hated me, one where I was socially in the best position I'd even been in(still applicable, too), where I'd left the, to quote a friend, "meh" moods that led to me not seeing anything wrong with sitting in a puddle in driving rain. A place where I was happier than I'd been in years but also more miserable than I'd ever been in my life.
If I left that behind before I'd met him, I'd also left behind being okay with others making a royal mudpit of my own home. I may not be the best at cleaning up, but I'm nowhere near making my living room cat-repelling in just a few days.
This was going nowhere. I loved him, but the things he did...or rather that he didn't do. I left the ability to be comfortable in my own mess and filth behind at a school with people I loved but teachers and staff that hated me, one where I was socially in the best position I'd even been in(still applicable, too), where I'd left the, to quote a friend, "meh" moods that led to me not seeing anything wrong with sitting in a puddle in driving rain. A place where I was happier than I'd been in years but also more miserable than I'd ever been in my life.
If I left that behind before I'd met him, I'd also left behind being okay with others making a royal mudpit of my own home. I may not be the best at cleaning up, but I'm nowhere near making my living room cat-repelling in just a few days.
And that? That's something I cannot tolerate. The ability to not only sit as a place gets trash but to ACTIVELY TRASH IT and wonder why that's a bad thing.
There is a large difference between being an inefficient cleaner comparable to a solar car running out of energy on a sunny day...and someone who willfully ignores cleaning up in the way of a gas vehicle's engine malfunctioning in the way of its name. I, like the inefficient solar car, at least TRY to clean up and often can keep my apartment from "running out of sun" for several months, theoretically, and I get better at it all the time, if very slowly. However, the one who is an over-compliant combustion engine? If I cannot completely keep up with my own cleaning I do not need an explosive anti-cleaner around. Eventually(okay, really not so eventually) I'd go insane, or wear myself out, or something like that.
No one needs that. And as much as you may like someone, if they cannot see they have growing to do, and before age 23 at that...it is unlikely they ever will see it, no matter what they say. Superficial acknowledgement is only as lasting as the memory of what they wore that day.
There are very few days that I can say I know what I wore on them without lying. One was the worst day of my life. One was honestly pretty fun, but sad too because I had to throw out the bottom part of my best work yet because the knees of my jeans didn't fit...and that was only the jeans anyways that I remember.
And the last? It was the last Christmas with my grandfather, and I wanted to sleep outside because Naples was closing down all the non-private-residence-or-hospital lights around and in Forest Glen and the surrounding area to funnel power to an orchard that would have frozen otherwise. Street lights, outside lights, Christmas lawn ornament lights, golf course lights, restaurants and Wal Marts and Kohls and Targets and Pubixes, and even gas stations. The stars were so bright I thought I was out at Misery on the boat for a minute, until I realized I wasn't actually on the boat, or on any boat.
No one needs that. And as much as you may like someone, if they cannot see they have growing to do, and before age 23 at that...it is unlikely they ever will see it, no matter what they say. Superficial acknowledgement is only as lasting as the memory of what they wore that day.
There are very few days that I can say I know what I wore on them without lying. One was the worst day of my life. One was honestly pretty fun, but sad too because I had to throw out the bottom part of my best work yet because the knees of my jeans didn't fit...and that was only the jeans anyways that I remember.
And the last? It was the last Christmas with my grandfather, and I wanted to sleep outside because Naples was closing down all the non-private-residence-or-hospital lights around and in Forest Glen and the surrounding area to funnel power to an orchard that would have frozen otherwise. Street lights, outside lights, Christmas lawn ornament lights, golf course lights, restaurants and Wal Marts and Kohls and Targets and Pubixes, and even gas stations. The stars were so bright I thought I was out at Misery on the boat for a minute, until I realized I wasn't actually on the boat, or on any boat.
But that's beside the point. The actual point is that...as much as you care for someone, if they refuse to see that they actually need change...there isn't much that can actually be done, is there? If they cannot see that their actions and beliefs are harmful to others, and also to themselves?
I refused to have to babysit my boyfriend. I refused to have to walk him through thoughts that shouldn't be THAT hard. I refused to clean up after him, when all he did was fight it. I refused to sit there and fight with someone who obviously only ever COULD learn through rote memorization, someone who couldn't even begin to guess how to start a mechanical clock, even though a further "suggestion" proved he wasn't beyond thinking "batteries did it." Yes, Big Ben used and uses batteries, that's exactly it. A several-hundred-year-old clock tower, and you just put a couple AAs in, maybe a C-cell or D-cell. Maybe a Baghdad battery? Oh! I know, plug it into the thousand year-old power grid from the Roman construction of Londinium.
And that's just on GRANDFATHER CLOCKS. Ask me about "non-melanistic panthers". That's a hoot! Please, it's hilarious!
I refused to have to babysit my boyfriend. I refused to have to walk him through thoughts that shouldn't be THAT hard. I refused to clean up after him, when all he did was fight it. I refused to sit there and fight with someone who obviously only ever COULD learn through rote memorization, someone who couldn't even begin to guess how to start a mechanical clock, even though a further "suggestion" proved he wasn't beyond thinking "batteries did it." Yes, Big Ben used and uses batteries, that's exactly it. A several-hundred-year-old clock tower, and you just put a couple AAs in, maybe a C-cell or D-cell. Maybe a Baghdad battery? Oh! I know, plug it into the thousand year-old power grid from the Roman construction of Londinium.
And that's just on GRANDFATHER CLOCKS. Ask me about "non-melanistic panthers". That's a hoot! Please, it's hilarious!
