This may seem trivial to others, but the size of a problem is totally dependant on the person's priorities. This is right at the top of mine.
Anyway, this is about a good friend of mine, who I shall refer to as F. F is a kind, caring, admittedly pretty individual (so much so that at times I feel embarrassed that I don't fancy her), but things have been hard for the poor girl. She's never had the best of luck with guys, most of her boyfriends turned out to be gay, and none of her other relationships worked out. One was with a guy I used to know, seemed real nice and unassuming. What I didn't know was after I left that school and when this person from college and this guy were dating, he was a pothead whose father was a drug dealer. This guy I shall refer to as J.
There is also another guy who I shall refer to as M. F used to mess around a bit with M, nothing serious, but at a party once they started messing around with handcuffs, ice cubes and, if they could have got it working, a can of whipped cream. They also had one kiss. That night, M told F he liked her, and for F, all her (somewhat miniscule) feeling for M died. Admittedly I thought this was pretty sh***y, even though I don't like M. When I talked to F about it, she said the reason she played around was it made her feel appreciated, that someone cared about her. I let her know that all of her friends appreciate and care about her, because it's true, she means a lot to us. The result of what she did, however, is M became obsessive about her, and still is.
Unfortunately, despite breaking up with him ages ago, F still likes J. When J didn't want to get back with her, that damn near broke her heart. However, F's family loved J more than they cared about F, so her mother and brother gave her hell about it, to the point of her mother saying the reason her relationships don't work out is that she is a tart, which is absolutely untrue. Anyone who can act in such a callous manner to their daughter is not fit to be called a mother, especially since she is hardly Miss Self-Esteem (though I'm beginning to understand why she isn't).
It gets worse though. F's mum didn't like her hair. She's 17, I think she's fully entitled to wear it how she likes, it wasn't extreme or anything, just brown roots, black hair, spirals, looked great. But no, since mummy doesn't approve, she cut it short while F was sleeping, and she's gotta go to college like that shortly. She's just jealous her daughter looks better than she does, and she's using F as a scapegoat for her own goddamn insecurities. She is not fit to be a mum. No mother would cut off their daughter's hair ni her sleep and try to make her feel like crap.
On top of THAT, yesterday F was reading some e-mails from her exes. The first few made her smile, but eventually she started crying. Now, I don't claim to be the nicest guy out there, in fact I'm a jerk, but I have one sole quality, one grace that doesn't quite save; I care deeply about my friends. Since I don't have any other qualities to help get these people through their problems, this so-called quality is more a pain in the arse than anything. Anyway, I cared about her to such an extent that I cried too. Now, I've always had empathy problems, crying comes very hard to me, sometimes I feel like crying so I'll sit down, stick on depressing music and try to let it out. On rare occasions maybe one tear will come out, while I stare on, stony faced. If something REALLY upsets me at a point in time, there might be two tears and I'm stony faced. Yesterday I managed four tears stony faced. The last time I cried any more was almost two years ago when my cat was run over, and that was full on sobbing. Odd since I don't even feel sad at family member's funerals. Regardless, it hurts me that my friend is in pain and I can't do a damn thing about it. I just wish I could give her a hug and tell her things will be ok, even though being the cynical old goat I am, I wouldn't believe it for a second. I guess I'll just have to try to cheer her up on Friday when we return to college.
I know I couldn't prevent her family from being pricks, or her mum cutting off her hair, or her relationships, but she's hurting and I've done nothing to help that. Some friend I am.
12 Sep 2006, 6:33 am
