things, and stuff

[dchenes]

This weekend was somewhat hectic. Friday night I came home, made soup (which took a couple of hours or so, but it was good soup the next day), and did dishes. Saturday morning we ran around and set up for the party, which was Saturday afternoon/evening and was a lot of fun. I think I definitely need to own Apples to Apples one of these days. Maybe even before Thanksgiving; it could be a lot of fun to play with my family.

Yesterday, I did five loads of laundry. That's it for productivity, unless you count starting at Z on the alphabet part of my current cross stitch project and getting up to U. Since I'm working from the bottom up, I had to start at the end of the alphabet.

I also tried (for five hours) to download an X11 driver for Mac OS X over a 56K modem, which of course got 95% done before my modem disconnected. I downloaded it at work in fifteen minutes. I just hope the Mac will read a CD created with Windows 2000. All this in aid of getting a word processor that reads the writing I did on my old Mac in MS Word...oh well. At least there are alternatives.

I've rediscovered that not only is it perfectly possible to be lonely while not being alone, it also makes it worse for me to be lonely and around people at the same time. There are times when I just want to be left alone to work through it, and being forced to be social doesn't help at all, but it's not really the kind of thing I can explain. If I tried to explain it, I suspect it would come out sounding like "No thanks, I'm being miserable right now", which of course makes people want to cheer me up, which isn't what I want. I don't know if it's what I need, but it definitely isn't what I want.

Human nature is odd stuff.

Comments

[biophile6.livejournal.com]

Being cheered up when depressed is depressing. Its what you dont need. It overstates that youre wrong, youre not valid, your feelings should be changed, and youre stubborn. It also forces you into a sub role, when you need to support yourself.

Its best to have someone understand, and not ask too many questions.

No "fixing" please. Its part of the whole package.

Exactly

[halleyscomet.livejournal.com]

It's been my experience that "cheering someone up" has one of the following consequences:

1. Pisses them off or makes them angry, with just cause.

2. Gets their mind off what is depressing them temporarily, if they already want to think about something else. Someone who wants to be distracted will seek out distraction. Someone who is off by themselves does not want distraction.

3. You don't actually cheer them up. You just give them a gentle reminder that you care about them and will be there when they're ready. This only does good if they need to be reminded that friends care. Making chicken soup for a sick friend and making a sincere and not patronizing offer of assistance to someone who is ill falls into this category.

So, in the future I resolve to do the following if I see someone who I think needs cheering up:

Sincerely Ask if there is anything I can do. Provide any assistance they ask for.

If I can think of something that will be meaningful to that person, I will make some gesture to show them I care, if I think such a gesture is what they want. Example, pick up someone's favorite chocolates when they've just been dumped.

This will be a departure from my normal meddling ways, but I made a decision Monday to reform my behavior for the better, and when I decide to change, I change Gosh Darn it.

And one last thing, I'm going to stop pestering people. I recently invited a couple of friends to a party, and they refused. I repeated the offer and even tried to shoot down some of their objections. I made an ass of myself in the process, and regret it.

No means No, even if it is about a party invitation.