#save decency

Both one of the best things to happen to me recently and one of the worst things to happen to me recently happened all in the last hour.

Last week I met my new neighbors. They’re really nice, easy to get along with, the husbands a toker, I’m psyched to finally have good neighbors again. Their son, who’s identical to the above, is my other new neighbor. This could be fun.

Last week I met my new neighbors. They like my dog, they don’t complain about my music, the husband is a toker who likes to share. See why I’m psyched about the new neighbors?

Yesterday, I spotted a social media post the wife had posted looking for help at a local musical dine-in theatre.

Today, the wife walked out of the house to put their dog out as I was getting out of my truck, so I wandered over there, flip-flops, a tank top talking about not chasing after men but if he’s got tattoos I might powerwalk, carrying a ratty laptop bag, and asked her if she was still looking for help.

She listed the 4 positions she needed to fill.

I’m not a bartender. I should be.

So I took one of the other 3 remaining positions.

When she went into the house to look at a schedule for a start date, she came back out 45 seconds later and says to come on in the house for a toke.

She gave me my start date, payday days, dress code, and shift options all while I toked with her hubby and he talked about their puppy.

On my way out the door, the wife happily said she would bring home a hiring package for me tomorrow.

I floated across the street with my head spinning trying to figure out if that really just happened or had I finally lost my mind. I was so excited I was ready to burst.

I had to tell somebody!

That’s when I crashed.

It hit me like a brick wall when I quickly realized I don’t have anyone to call. I didn’t have anyone who will let me tell them my really great news, be happy for me about my really great news, I mean actually happy, not fake happy, and be excited with me. My excited, elated high came crashing down and I stood in my kitchen with tears running down my face, having an anxiety attack. I couldn’t catch my breath. I stood there crying, hyperventilating for a good 5 minutes before I slowly started to get myself under control. 20 minutes after I started to crash, I was mostly back under control, but I was also exhausted.

I thought I could call my cousin. She drives me crazy, but I thought maybe she would be happy for me. Maybe I could tell her my good news, maybe without having to listen to her trivial crap, and I do mean trivial- 15 minutes about a guy who just pulled in her driveway looking for his dog and was he actually looking for his dog or is he a maniac- trivial. How tired her kids were.

40 minutes into a phone ‘conversation’ and my cousin hasn’t asked how my day was. Now she’s singing some Diplo (I think that’s who the guy is) song going I’ll know it even though I’ve told her 4 times that I don’t. After 47 minutes she hung up with a my daughters ‘rocking out, I’m going to go crank some music and watch her, talk to you later’ *click*

The other person I thought to call, I text first, to see if they were busy. When they replied ‘little bit, why?’ I immediately replied ‘not important, thanks!’. I didn’t want to inconvenience them.

An hour later- 47 minutes on the phone, and 3 text messages later- I haven’t told anyone my really great news.

I understand that other people have a lot going on too. I’m not being ignorant of that fact. But if you knew me, you would know I give my last 20 bucks to women at gas stations who tell convincing stories about trying to flee abuse who turn out to actually live a block over from the gas station and tells this story frequently to solicit money from people. You’d also know I would give my last 20 bucks to any woman with the same story at a gas station who looked like she needed help regardless of how many times I got scammed. I stay up 38 hours straight so I can keep my friend awake a full 24 hours, drive 90 minutes to the city, fight with early morning traffic because she needs to have a sleep deprived study done to map her seizure activity. She sleeps while I drive home. I’m the ‘drop my plans last minute because a friend needs a babysitter’, The ‘alright I suppose this is what we’re doing even though I don’t want to but will because she had a bad day’, The ‘of course I’ll take care of your cats even though they attack me, you never clean their litter box and I have to do it, can’t breathe in your house it smells so bad’ person. I pay for seniors groceries, I buy coffee for the people behind me in the drive-through. I left dozens of those ridiculous fidget spinners at stores all over town last summer. I’d buy them and leave them with the store for kids who come in looking for them but don’t have the money to get one. I’ll help pretty much anyone. I’ve taken in kids for weeks, sometimes months at a time because their parents refused to let them live at home or to take care of them. I’ll give you a second chance. A third. Maybe a fourth. In some cases a tenth, a twentieth. I wear my heart on my sleeve, and I get taken advantage of. A lot. A lot is an understatement. More frequently than I care to admit. It’s a problem. I’m endlessly searching for the humanity in humans, I’m too trusting, I have too much empathy, I want to find the good in someone even when there’s none to be found. I’ve gone to extremes in my loyalty to people who really matter to me, even though they don’t deserve my loyalty or respect. 

1 1/2 hours later, I’ve told someone, the same someone I stayed up 38 hours, drove sleep deprived for. Their response? ‘Sweet’, followed 5 minutes later with a ‘this new guy I met is coming over to drink wine, do you have wine glasses I can borrow?’, followed by a ‘never mind someone else brought me some’. Followed a bit later by ‘when do you start?’. When they found out my start date was also their birthday, I got a ‘so you're not going to be around for my B-day then. Well, that sucks’. When I assured them that I would only be gone during the day and still be able to participate in their birthday activities in the evening- which really just consist of sitting in a local bar and drinking- that wasn’t good enough. I haven’t heard from them since. 

If you knew me, you would know I’ll spend 38+ hours keeping you awake because you’re my friend, you need help, and you asked. You would know I would say ‘yes, absolutely’. You would know about my blood disorder, not actually remember it though, and be unaware that I’ll suffer for days afterward, because I’ll put on a smiling face and ‘sure, I’ll give you a ride to the store’ later that same day, or the next day.

I’m not excited for myself anymore.

Now I think the entire thing is a terrible idea, and that I should walk across the street, apologize, and tell the very nice lady that this has all been a giant mistake, and I’m very very sorry. It’s been 105 minutes, she can’t have turned down that many people.