You guys need to post links like that to the tumblr.

---

Good morning.

First off, I love all y'all. And deeply appreciate your guidance and wisdom. Buffistas are wise, so say we all.

I'm sorry. But also, congratulations.

I don't know you, but I love you, Beverly.

The Dance of Anger

Zen, thank you for this really important reminder. I have gone to the shelf and taken this book down for rereading this weekend. I, too, read it an eon ago and can really use the refresher now.

The Relationship Constitution

I've discussed this with a couple of rl friends and gotten deeply appreciative nods of recognition.

It's great to hear about relationships where one of the organizing principles is flexibility...almost elasticity in a way. They can stretch and bend, but have the core integrity.

I am going to take responsibility for accepting my relationship with K, early on, without that elasticity. I do, in my higher mind, believe that the core integrity could be there. She isn't a bad, or even uncaring person. She IS so sensitive to her own fears and defenses that she cannot be sensitive to the emotional needs of others. Given her closer relationships with some truly difficult people, that makes sense.

My mistake was believing that my galaxy for care for her would mean she could, when required, be different for me. That was me being stupid...or needful...or whatever.

It's not her fault that I need to let her go.

---

bonny, I am logging in from France just to tell you that you were not stupid. Love and friendship require risks and sometimes they just don't pay off. You're awesome and I hope to meet you offline soon.

---

I have been lucky enough to meet bonny offline and was instantly charmed.

Hi Bev! Good to see your pixels. Probably won't get to see a doc until next week, I'm going to try and avoid a trip to urgent care this time in NOLA. I think it's poison ivy, just can't figure out how I got it. If it doesn't start clearing up, I'll go see a doc.

At the gate at RDU. Did the nudie scan. They took my contact solution to check it, but let through a full water bottle! I had forgotten to dump it and no one even said anything.

Poor B's car broke down 50 miles out from KC, so he's had to buy a plane ticket after all. Uggh.

---

She IS so sensitive to her own fears and defenses that she cannot be sensitive to the emotional needs of others. Given her closer relationships with some truly difficult people, that makes sense.

That's a really important insight into your friend. Getting past her fears and defenses may be a prerequisite to her having relationships with non-difficult people (ones that last, anyway). She may not be aware that there ARE any non-difficult people!

I know that one of my own barriers to making new friends is that I tend to approach every possible new relationship with a wary attitude of "now what is THIS going to cost me?". From conversations with my sister and mother, this attitude that "relationships are more trouble than they're worth and you always end up getting hurt" seems to be endemic in our family. We're distrustful loners, and it's really hard to break out of that and embrace (not literally) other people. But that's me, not necessarily K., so... yeah. Projecting.

My mistake was believing that my galaxy for care for her would mean she could, when required, be different for me. That was me being stupid...or needful...or whatever.

You weren't being stupid, nor any more needful than any human being! You're certainly not the first person to believe that - I think it's a normal human belief, that giving someone (nearly) unconditional caring/love is the way to make them "open up" and feel the same back for you. Sadly, in my experience at least, this almost never happens. People who can/will care for us, do. People who can't/won't, aren't gonna, no matter how good we are to them or how much we give. They seem to see our willingness, even eagerness, to give as either (1) an exploitable weakness, (2) their just due in life, or (3) simply a cute personality characteristic ("She's a giver") that has nothing to do with them or how they behave towards us.

Now I'm thinking of a convo I had once with a particularly unpleasant woman, who was angry with her brother for wanting her to - do something, I forget, something like drive him to the airport, not donate a kidney - the woman felt that if her brother wanted something back for all the things he'd done for her, then he shouldn't have done them, because she didn't want any "strings" attached. Granted I didn't try very hard to explain it, but she seemed unable to grasp that even though her brother might not have wanted any*thing* in return, he probably did want a reciprocal emotional consideration.

I try to get inside peoples' heads, just to see what the world looks like to them. Usually I don't like it in there.

---

(Ironic that the person who introduced me to the Nields in the first place is now the reason I can't listen to the song "Gotta Get Over Greta" without wincing, but I guess that's life.)

Ah, yeah, I can appreciate that irony. My high-school-era best friend and I got into the Nields together and would sing along gleefully to "Gotta Get Over Greta" and "James" ("James visits the Washington Zoo / He says I like the invertebrates best / He says they remind me of my friends from high school / They're all so spineless"). Then came years of antagonism, jealousy, bad feelings verging on hostility, and eventually the end of that friendship. I still think of her when I listen to those songs now, but in a very different way.

smonster, I hope B gets to New Orleans quickly & easily!

And Drew, I meant to say yesterday, I'm sorry for your loss.

---

Interesting meeting with the three scary women from the uni. (The Girl and I had hours of mirth over them putting me in room T4 for the meeting.) They've presented me with some solutions to the problems, which, while not great, seem to be the best they can do under the (very frustrating) circumstances. At least they're doing some things for me now. Next I have to decide whether to go part time, as I'd been planning, or go for a modified full time programme. I'll officially be restarting in January, which is a bit of a bugger, but there you go. Could be worse.

Hope you get a solution to the poison ivy, smonster! Have a good flight.

---

This is an impasse, and the onus is on her to change, because the truth is, you've already moved on.

I do feel I have to respond in this woman's defense - I don't see where there's an onus on her to do anything. If the ball is in her court, she has every right to leave it there and walk away.

This whole conversation has made me very uncomfortable because there seems to be an unspoken assumption that Bonny is somehow entitled to this woman's friendship because of a relationship they've had in the past, and I really don't believe that's ever the case, in any relationship.

---

Hands Seska a cuppa I'm sorry you had to go to that stressful meeting. I hope their fixes help.

---

Jessica, I actually totally agree with you. No one is entitled to anyone's friendship simply because they have been connected.

Clearly, it would be impossible to articulate everything about my friendship with K but there is one of two things I DO feel entitled to. Either follow-through on agreements about the way we are to communicate OR a clear message that the agreement no longer stands. That is honest and fair.

As a point of reference, before K moved to AZ, I suggested that we scale back our connection because I'm acutely aware of how things can shift for people. She reacted completely opposite of what I expected. "NO, NO. You are my most important friend and I won't lose you or ever stop being your friend."

I confess to hearing what I wanted to hear.

The crappy communication thing was annoying, but not fatal. Telling me that she would be there for me when I was sick and then blowing me off. That was fatal.

You are right. I'm not entitled to anyone staying connected to me, but I am entitled to honesty and, heaven's forswear, a little respect.

---