My Big Fat Momentous Decision

I feel GREAT today! Better than I’ve felt for days. Not physically, but emotionally. Want to know why?

Today I’ve vowed to keep my big mouth shut.

I’ve been struggling this week with the number of people who have recently solicited my advice yet haven’t taken it. I realize people aren’t obligated to take my advice, so I can’t fault them. However, I CAN change my response to these requests. And I’ve made the liberating decision to decline such requests—no more advice, solicited and otherwise.

If someone wants my input, I’ll come up with something. Input is easier to dispense than advice. It can be as simple as one thought that, when added to the clamor of all the other input the person has reeled in from friends and family, may or may not get used. When people ask for input, they’re comparing options. One person’s input may carry no more weight than anyone else’s.

But advice is altogether different. There is an implied trust between the asker and the giver—an implied respect—that compels me to honor the request with supreme thoughtfulness, seriousness, and compassion. It requires consideration of many scenarios and their outcomes. Guiding the person through these possibilities to make the best decision takes time and energy. And I believe the advice should be regarded by the receiver in the same light.

I’m not alone in this. I know other folks who are bothered when people—especially family members—ask for their advice and then subsequently find that it’s been ignored. Often, people who ask for advice have no idea why the people they ask get upset. I believe advice-dispensers must view this as a communication problem—a language glitch and not a personal snub. It’s up to us to ascertain whether individuals want our advice or our input. If we have to explain the difference, fine. It may be the only way to prevent future hurt feelings, which can jeopardize relationships.

Anyway, today I’ve decided that mum’s the word. And mum feels fine.

[Art: Three Wise Sock Monkeys—See No Evil, Speak No Evil, Hear No Evil by PeeWee's ClayHouse.]

Talk, Talk, Talk: Rising Above the Din

I used to watch older couples in restaurants when I was young and idealistic (i.e., stupid) about relationships. There was always a pair who spoke hardly a word to one another throughout their meal. I interpreted their silence as boredom, disinterest, waning compatibility. I thought it strange, sorrowful, dumb—and vowed never to find myself in their place.

I was reminded of this commitment recently when I overheard a woman talking to her friends:

The other night my husband asked, “Have we spoken to each other yet this evening?”
I said, “No, I don’t think so.”
“Do you want to?”
“Not really.”

This spurred knowing laughter from the woman’s companions who knew that there can be a good silence in relationships. It’s a quiet that rises from feeling emotionally attached without saying so, from knowing one another so completely that communication doesn't require sound. It’s the enviable ability to simply “be” with your partner.

My husband and I have become one of those older couples I didn’t understand in my youth, and I couldn’t be happier “being” together.

[Art by Van Gogh.]

The Two Most Important Words in Any Relationship

Last week I got a phone call concerning our eviction case. It was a legal assistant from our lawyer’s office who was checking to see if we’d been paying our rent. I assumed she was calling because I usually send proof to my lawyer that the landlord received my rent check, but I hadn’t yet done it for April. I was still waiting for my certified mail return receipt to arrive. However, I told her, the check cleared on April 1. Then the conversation went something like this:

“Are you sending money orders?” she asked.

“No, the landlord agreed to accept personal checks.”

“So have you paid your rent?”

“Yes, and I’ve sent proof of payment every month but this one. As I said, I’m just waiting for the certified mail receipt.”

“But you’ve paid it?”

“Yes, the check already cleared.”

“Let’s see. You’ve been paying $350?”

$350?! Was she looking at the wrong file? “No, I’m paying—have always paid—$______.” Did I miss something that last day in court? Was I given a deal to pay only $350 a month and didn’t know it?

Once we finally seemed to be on the same page, I brought up a matter I’d been concerned about. I told her that based on how Mr. Slimy had been treating other tenants, it looked doubtful that he’d return our security deposit to us. What did she think about approaching Mr. Slimy to keep our security deposit in lieu of our final month’s rent?

Had I known how incendiary this question was I never would have asked it.

The legal assistant reprimanded me for even considering the idea and proceeded to tell me how much her organization had done for us—how proud everyone there was of their work on our behalf, that they’d never before won so many extra months beyond an eviction notice for tenants to remain in their apartments.

“Yes,” I said, “but you never had anyone with a long-term lease like ours…”

“Oh yes we did!” she cut in. “We’ve worked on lots of long-term leases.”

I thought, Then what took you so bloody long to understand our rental situation? Why did we have to explain ourselves over and over and over again? But I held my tongue.

She continued saying something about the paperwork they sent us in March that we were to sign and return, that they’d have to open our case again and return to court.

I kept asking, “What papers? We didn’t receive any papers in March!” But she steamrolled through my questions, starting in again about how grateful we should be that her organization took our case, how deplorable and disrespectful to her colleagues it would be for us to not pay our last month’s rent.

I kept saying, “I was only wondering about it. I thought I’d ask, but clearly I won’t do it. So we needn’t continue discussing it. But will you please tell me what the papers were that you sent in March?”

But she couldn’t stop going on about how much they’d done for us. To cut through her manic drone, at one point I yelled her name, intending to say, “I’M the one who forged the deal! I’M the one who negotiated directly with Mr. Slimy!” But I bit my tongue. I just said, “Look. I’m not lying. I told you we’d pay the last month’s rent and we will. I’m sorry about the papers in March, but we didn’t receive them. I will sign whatever it is you need me to sign, I will continue paying our rent and sending proof to your office that I did, and I will anticipate losing my security deposit to the landlord because once we move out, we want NOTHING more to do with him.”

THEN she started telling me that we could use one of their lawyers who works on nothing but security deposits to get ours back.

I thanked her for the information (which I already knew about), and said it wouldn’t be necessary. But she couldn’t drop the subject. She told me how different everything would be by the time we moved out, how I couldn’t know what the future would bring or how I would react to it.

She was right, but I’d had enough of her. Oh. I forgot to mention that in the middle of her tirade about all they’d done for us she began reading aloud from the court orders. This AFTER she’d said she would mail that paperwork to us.

I couldn’t absorb any more. And I could no longer be civil—I needed to get off the phone before saying something I’d regret. So I reiterated my assurance that we’d pay the last month’s rent and would look for the papers in the mail.

I hung up and screamed an ugly name at her.

This, of course, woke my husband. I recounted my phone conversation for him, trying to get some perspective on it. Though the legal assistant represented a pro bono law firm, I got the distinct impression that her condescension toward me was a power play—that the byproduct of pro bono work for her was ratcheting up her superiority.

Then the phone rang. It was HER!! NOW what?

A miraculous thing: She apologized. She admitted that the papers were sent in January, not March. She explained that the case hadn’t been closed and reopened nor would it need to be reopened. It was all a mistake.

I accepted her apology.

And then she continued talking!!

She was all sweetness and psychological counsel about how it might not seem like it now, but a move is exciting, yada yada yada.

I let her talk—tried not to throw up. And finally I got her off the phone. I was exhausted.

But here’s the important part of the story (you were wondering if I’d ever get to it, weren’t you?): I couldn’t be mad at her any longer because she apologized. There’s a cleansing effect to apologies—especially those made sooner rather than later.

I believe it took courage for her to make that second call to me. (Or, as my father surmised, it took the command from someone who outranked her.) I don’t know if I would have been able to do the same. But she will remain in my mind as a decent example of turning around a tainted relationship, of taking ownership of a mistake and bad behavior, of eating humble pie.

[Pics from top to bottom: Fencing advertisement for the 1900 Summer Olympic Games; the New York City Fencers’ Club as shown in an 1888 issue of Leslie’s Weekly; and José de Ribera’s The Duel of Women.]