“You’re not like other girls,” said my best friend Dave back in high school. “Most of them come on all sweet and soft and nice, but when you really get to know them, inside it turns out they’re kinda bitchy.”
“Your point?”
“You pretend to be tough as nails—so strong and sure of yourself—but inside you’re a marshmallow.”
He was grinning like a Chesire cat, so I took it as a compliment.
Truth be told, I’ve always worn my feelings on my sleeve. Mom called me her “emotional child.” And it’s still true—I cry more easily and hurt more deeply than most everyone I know.
“Put on your Big Girl Panties and get over it,” my friend Sheila often chided me.
Sometimes that works, but there are many things I’m unable just to “let go.” Here’s a small sampling:
I hurt when I send out 70 Christmas party invitations, and only 28 bother to RSVP (which was specifically requested so I could plan the amount of food.)
I hurt when someone asks “How can I help?” but then isn’t available, or willing, when you ask for a small favor. I’d rather they didn’t bother to give lip service to concern.
I hurt (both emotionally and financially) when literally hundreds of people say “I can’t wait to buy your book,” but then either don’t buy it, or one of them buys it and a dozen passes it around. (I’m in business here, people!)
I hurt when I’m away from home for a few months tending to a friend, and when I try to return to my peninsula life, new friendships and cliques have been formed and I’m left out of all the activities they plan. It’s as if I died.
I hurt when phone calls, texts, and emails are ignored. At least acknowledge them—don’t make me think I must have done something wrong—unless I have. And then, please give me a chance to make amends; I’m not a mind reader. Communication is a two-way street.
And I especially hurt when I post from my heart and gut on Facebook, working to sort out some problem, garnering outside opinions and support, and I get inundated with private messages admonishing me, claiming that “Facebook is not the place to air such things.”
Hello? You want only silly stories and funny cat pictures?
So I customized some of my posts, “blocking” a few who’d rather not read anything that isn’t all light and sweet and happy.
And then I caught hell because someone on the list “didn’t know” something that was going on. And I drove myself nuts trying to respect everyone else’s post preferences, sharing this with some, that with others.
Someone suggested I air my personal angst in my blog, but that’s not going to work. You can’t customize who reads it on the Internet, and there are those whose feelings I’m trying to spare when I am striving to process uncomfortable circumstances and vent.
Imagine that—me, trying to spare someone else’s feelings. Guess I’m just too sensitive.