Saturday, October 30, 2010

Misanthrope for the next four weeks, maybe more

I’ve always disliked staying at other people’s houses, even as a child.

This turned into a phobia after a two day visit to a friend of a friend in Sydney. I was supposed to return to Melbourne by train with my friend but ill and in pain I decided to stay overnight without her and fly back.

I was left alone in the flat, nothing in the fridge except a can of pineapple juice which I opened and had a glass before I caught a taxi to the airport. I left a gift for my hostess and a note saying that I had opened the juice.

A week later with no phone call from my friend, strange since we spoke or saw each other just about every day. The friendship apparently was at an end on the advice of her boyfriend. I was not a suitable person for her to be around.

Considering the time I’d known her boyfriend and that I’d been sleeping with his brother, it was an odd time to decide I was unsuitable as a friend.

I met her for the last time to hand over photographs of the Sydney trip and to ask the big question, why no more friendship.

The flat we stayed in belonged to his mother, a born again Christian of the rabid Catholic kind. According to her, I had stolen food, imposed on them by overstaying 12 hours, left without saying goodbye and thank you. Above all, I was the worst kind of female, in her opinion I was well on the way to becoming a (gasp) lesbian. That gob smacked me and I can only think it was because I had walked into the bathroom in my petticoat to hand a towell to my friend. These were the days of bra, girdle, stockings, full length petticoat, you know, ‘move along, nothing to see here’.

The last was also hurtful because the son sharing my bed did not tell his mother that she was mistaken probably to assure her that he was still her virgin child. Over 40 years ago and that betrayal still sends hate arrows if I hear a certain song.

I had known the friend and boyfriend for some years, neither had defended me. Friendship severed.

A fleeting phone call some years later brought home the fact that when people say you can’t go back, it’s really true. Another reason I would never follow facebook.

As far as I was concerned I had done everything that etiquette demanded of a guest but a phobia was born and I still dislike staying with other people in their home.

The point of all this is that I have someone not staying but visiting at the oddest times and seems to have no idea of what one does in someone else’s home.

I would not dream of asking to borrow cosmetics.

I would not have a shower in another’s bathroom.

I would not be cooking in another’s kitchen at 11 at night.

I would not invite my parents over when the owner of the home is in her grotty old dressing gown after a day at the oldies party and not tell her they were coming until they were on the doorstep.

I would not tie the owner’s lace curtain in a knot so one could lie on the bed to watch the birds.

And so on.

I apologized to my mother yesterday. She was crazy, bitchy and thoroughly horrible before she went to the home but she had two years of the ill-mannered troll that I am now wanting to choke after 3 weeks.

I should have let mum do away with her and pleaded justifiable homicide due to insanity.

I have not said anything to the BrickOutHouse, he knows. He has offered to go away as soon as he can sit to drive the car, bad idea and one I was trying to avoid by not saying anything.

You see, I have been in this position before with my son and his girlfriend. She won the battle and he left at 17. These two women are of a kind. They saw the man they wanted, they got the man they wanted and they will lie, cheat, connive and kill to keep the man they wanted. The only difference between them is that one was aggressive-aggressive and one is passive-aggressive. But the one I’m dealing with now could give A-A a 10 length start and still beat her in the bitch stakes and I never thought I’d be saying that.

Tension if you're reading this....PISS OFF

12 comments:

R.H. said...

Shocked.


Speechless.

River said...

If she's only visiting she has absolutely NO right to be showering and cooking, let alone borrowing cosmetics.
Cosmetics should never be shared anyway, there's a cross-contamination risk.
Your last line should have been typed in bold and extra large so "tension" couldn't possibly miss it.

iODyne said...

Tension - if you are reading this: it is totally beyond rudeness to invite late-evening guests into a home you are yourself, an UNinvited guest at, and to not advise your host beforehand is just mind-numbingly rude.
piss off out of there you slag.

My story: years ago living alone in a large house, I relented unwillingly to the pleading of a local grammar school head, to take as a boarder, a desperate one the school had no room for.

I was not prepared for her WEIRD father to visit every night till quite late. They did lock themselves in her large room' but still I had no privacy in my own home and it was horrible.
Dear Coppy - put your own needs above The Convalescent's.
Survival and self-preservation is our most basic instinct.

Ann ODyne said...

Apollo's Angels is a wonderful new book on the evolution of the ballet. Link is to Vanity Fair review.

Kath Lockett said...

Your house, CW, your rules.

Tension is a shockr; no buts about it. As with all the other passive-aggressive and aggressive-aggressive women you speak of, what do these men see in them (apart from bedroom gymnastics of course) for them to be able to behave like this?

.....unless, of course that 'bedroom gymnastics' is the ONLY reason?

bugger.

Middle Child said...

I have four sisters. I now only have two who speak with me. Sadly I had to sever ties because it all got too vicious and I just pulled back - even with rellos - some people you just need out of your life - and after the hurt you feel 100% There are heaps of worthy people out there...

Middle Child said...

And what Marshall - Stacks said

Anonymous said...

I don't like staying in other peoples' houses either. They always worry about me ricocheting off walls when I go to bed. I always ricochet in a controlled manner.

Jayne said...

Tension belongs down the S bend.
I hear a firm grip is all that is required...;)

JahTeh said...

Robbert, I didn't think there was anything in this world that would render you speechless let along shocked.

To everyone else, it got worse after this. Saturday he goes to a mate's place, gets stuck because of the rain so stays for a BBQ. She arrives early, asks after a recipe I had but when I came back she'd gone. Long time in the toilet I thinks, but no she is asleep in his bed. He comes in soaking wet, how long has she been here, from me, long enough. He wants to know if I've eaten and my only comment was, I ate when Goldilocks was sleeping.
She left at 10.30 after tense voices in the bedroom and no, I didn't listen.
Sunday, he's off for a walk and 2 hours later I get a call to say he's in Noble Park and will be sleeping the night on her bedroom floor.
When his mother rings, she goes ballistic. I'm worried for the spine because he still can't sit.
He is now home and I have said Hello. The cat is on my bed and not speaking to him. I've been at the pub since 12 and I'm slightly pissed but not enough that I don't remember my sister borrowing $100 off me.
Thank goodness 'Criminal minds' is on tonight for some insane violence.

Mindy said...

You should be Australia's second saint Jahteh. You really should. I don't know how you manage.

JahTeh said...

Mindy, I tried yelling once and it lost me a son but the silent treatment doesn't seem to be any better and this isn't a kid, 38 years old. My sister boy and she's just called him 'thick as a brick'.