"You don't find it a blessing to help, but rather a burden to be asked; I get that now."

A couple weeks ago in Cat and Mouse Games I shared my most recent infatutory foibles in the form of a re-kindled attraction to a high school era former friend. Funky chicken, dude!

The situation came to a head three days later, which was a day short of the day I planned to reply. I woke up to an email asking me for a "really huge favor", but without actually saying what it was. What I mean to say is that the "favor" she asked in the email didn't quite rate as "really huge" given that she only asked me to ask family and friends if they knew of any properties for rent that might fit her son's needs. Hmmm...

But a few hours later I learned what the real favor was--and I resented the sort of "bait-and-switch" nature of the email vs. her later phone call. Turned out that she had found an apartment online, and a different contact (I don't know the nature of their relationship) that was going to physically check it out for her was 90 minutes away and was unable or unwilling to do it, so would I please go instead? I was already a bit salty about the whole email ignoring deal, and when I figured out why she was contacting me then, those feelings grew a bit stronger. But I was unskillful in my response--I should have explained what was happening with me right then. Instead, I affected a cool, distant demeanor, and once she finally directly asked me if I would go look at the apartment for her, I politely declined. Sounding shocked, she asked me why not. I crypticly responded that I didn't feel it was my role. While I was willing to help in some ways, I really wasn't interested in spending almost three hours on a bus to participate in her Help Me Move My Son to a Town Neither He Nor I Have Ever Visited project. Once she got that I wasn't going to be visiting that apartment for her, she couldn't get off the phone fast enough. To be fair, I suspect the frosty vibe I was fronting may have been more the reason.

I was feeling both regret and irritation once off the phone. I was not at my best at that moment--on the phone, and even before--choosing to interpret the events in such a negative way. I might have even been "right" about how I was seeing things--but even so, I could have been more conscious and compassionate. So I wrote her a short email explaining why I was annoyed (being ignored or unnoticed until my help was expected). A couple hours later I received another call from her--this time from home (the first was from her job). I assumed she had read my email, but I was wrong. She called because she was weirded out by how I was on the phone with her earlier. So...I explained things to her again. She claimed a sort of "eureka!" moment where she said she understood why I might have reacted negatively to her appeals for help--after not getting any response to my email for two weeks. But the "understanding" stopped there, because she was put off by my unwillingness to check out places for her, claiming that she would have happily done the same for me.

Eventually I got a response to the email I sent after our first call of the day, as follows:

My goal is to only ever be a blessing and never a burden. I see life in terms of love and people in terms of how I can best be loving towards them. I find it a blessing when I can help someone. So, if I can ever help you, I hope you will let me know. You don't find it a blessing to help, but rather a burden to be asked; I get that now.

Call me paranoid, but that last line could be interpreted as an attack. So, I'm not sure we are friends any more, or if we ever were.

After all this, I clearly have some work to do.