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Another side effect of this week's social whirlwind is that I've blatantly overused my feet twice in less than a week. Twice in a week is very very bad. Part of me is whining that nobody invites me to all this fun stuff the rest of the year, and the saner part of me is replying that that's because I can't go. Part of me is whining that we did all that walking and really flared up my feet, and the saner part is replying that if people stayed within my limitations no one could have gone.
It hurts to realize that I really can't be doing these things. The day in Berkeley was lovely, but it's Wednesday now and I haven't recovered. I'm supposed to be babying my feet in the hopes of slow healing; this week has probably set me back what, a month? Two? If any healing is happening at all, of course.
(Mary, do you have a guess about how far we walked? A mile? It would be interesting to know.)
I will have to face the fact that I am sufficiently physically disabled that it is a factor in my social life.
1) A LJ-friend of mine posted a while back about his frustration walking with someone who was slow. Check, I thought, likely no in-person friendship with this one. I want people to hang out with me because THEY WANT TO, not because they are being virtuous and suppressing their frustration. Heck, I'm angry and frustrated enough about this issue for several people! I don't need others being bothered by me!
2) If I need special consideration for walking and parking and all that jazz, that changes the equation of how fun it is to be around me. It can be annoying when one person is putting limitations on a group's activity. At the end of the day, what matters is whether everybody had a good time. To push that equation over to the positive side, I need to offer more of something else good -- more laughter, more helpfulness, more insight, more creativity, goodness knows what -- than I would need if I didn't have physical limitations butting in.
Therefore, my friends and I will self-select. People who don't want to hang around a gimp won't. People who don't want to wait won't. I'll hang out less with people who seem frustrated or who run on ahead of me, because damn bringing up the rear all the time is humiliating. Those who do choose to be with me will be doing it because it's worth their while... and for right now, I'll be over here figuring out what it is that will make it worth their while. There WILL BE something. There probably already is. For my sanity I want to be aware of what that is, and nurture it.
It hurts to realize that I really can't be doing these things. The day in Berkeley was lovely, but it's Wednesday now and I haven't recovered. I'm supposed to be babying my feet in the hopes of slow healing; this week has probably set me back what, a month? Two? If any healing is happening at all, of course.
(Mary, do you have a guess about how far we walked? A mile? It would be interesting to know.)
I will have to face the fact that I am sufficiently physically disabled that it is a factor in my social life.
1) A LJ-friend of mine posted a while back about his frustration walking with someone who was slow. Check, I thought, likely no in-person friendship with this one. I want people to hang out with me because THEY WANT TO, not because they are being virtuous and suppressing their frustration. Heck, I'm angry and frustrated enough about this issue for several people! I don't need others being bothered by me!
2) If I need special consideration for walking and parking and all that jazz, that changes the equation of how fun it is to be around me. It can be annoying when one person is putting limitations on a group's activity. At the end of the day, what matters is whether everybody had a good time. To push that equation over to the positive side, I need to offer more of something else good -- more laughter, more helpfulness, more insight, more creativity, goodness knows what -- than I would need if I didn't have physical limitations butting in.
Therefore, my friends and I will self-select. People who don't want to hang around a gimp won't. People who don't want to wait won't. I'll hang out less with people who seem frustrated or who run on ahead of me, because damn bringing up the rear all the time is humiliating. Those who do choose to be with me will be doing it because it's worth their while... and for right now, I'll be over here figuring out what it is that will make it worth their while. There WILL BE something. There probably already is. For my sanity I want to be aware of what that is, and nurture it.
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FWIW, there's someone I should have dumped four months earlier than I did, because of her blatant annoyance with my walking speed (and that was just from an infected toe, not the actual handicap I have now)
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See, I've been on the other side of that equation, too. I used to walk fast, back when I could. Because that was my natural walking speed it was difficult to match speeds with someone slower -- it took concentration. I'd do something silly like listen to what the person said, and I'd forget to concentrate on the walking, and boom!, I'd be running on ahead again.
But I'm learning. Lots. And hey, if these foot problems make me high-maintenance, well... my job now is to be worth it, that's all.
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Do what you need to do to take care of yourself. Friends take that into account. Friends recognize your worth and the gimpiness doesn't matter. Geez, if I were to visit you, I'd be visiting with YOU, not your feet, not your house, not the dishes piled up in the sink, not anything else that people worry about that really doesn't matter in a friendship. What matter is how friends interact, the fun they have when together, and how they make each other feel.
You don't have to push yourself to be more, more, more just to keep or attract friends. Just be you. That's already good.
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I guess I tend to notice some forms more than I notice others. Some people are just genuinely a pain in the butt. I know one guy... well, let's just say if he had any sense of humor or was a good listener, it sure would help, because everything else around him has to be done HIS fussy way!
Fortunately, I think I do have other worthwhile attributes. :-)
You don't have to push yourself to be more, more, more just to keep or attract friends.
I must've come across as wanting to remake myself. :-) I think there's nothing wrong with trying to improve, say, my conversational skills or my table manners, but I am not going to turn myself into someone different in the hopes that someone will like me. It just wouldn't work very well. I want friends who like ME, not just the public persona I've constructed.