We need a dilemma icon..but here it is..
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| Fri, 11-26-2004 - 6:51am |
Ok, before I start, I know I handeled the situation VERY BADLY and BADLY BEHAVED. So no need to remind me, because it's depressing enough how it is already. I've been thinking about the situation over a week now, but I am unsure how to deal with it, so you are being asked.
Anyhow... My Dilemma.
When I was in the hospital (which was literally down the street from me), I had a Doctor that had just gotten married to an American Girl and living in my very small town. He was excited that we both lived just two streets away from one another and said that his wife would be so happy to meet me, because she gets so lonely due to the small amount of german she speaks and getting used to the culture here. She's also from Louisianna, so being a southerner myself, he was thrilled. Before I got out, he came by my room and said he was going out of town and if I would call his wife to meet her for an evening out. I agreed. I was just as happy as he was to finally have another american in town, since they are very far and very few from where I live.
Anyhoooooooo
We talked for hours before we met and got along really well and laughed alot. I noticed that she was shy and she is also much younger (24) and no children, but planned on having some soon. We talked about me smoking and trying to quit soon, but how hard it is for me at the moment with lot's going on. So, however the age difference we seemed to have hit off. She told me that another woman is also living in the next town, american, and her husband works for my company, but in Russia. So he commutes every week back and forth. She asked if I would mind if all 3 of us met. I said sure, no problem, that would be great.
Fast forwarding.....
We met at a Restaurant in the next town. Unfortunately, due to trying to get the kids to bed and loads of evening traffic I was 30 minutes late, but let them know. They already had ordered their food and started. I was a little bit miffed, but I figured, oh well, they were starving. The other American is also from the south (Tennessee), my age, no children, and a VERY strict vegetarian and also doesn't wear any makeup. The doctors wife, is also pretty natural but she wears a bit of lipstick. No problem, because I think that women who can show themselves naturally is very attractive. Unfortunately, I don't have that option, so I always basically have the works on my face. I noticed when I walked in that she was already looking at me up and down, but I tried not to notice and I smiled, apologized and started being talkative. I also ordered and noticed they were all drinking a glass of wine so I ordered one to. I never lit a cigarrette, because I didn't want to seem rude. When I am with my friends I do, because they all smoke as well.
The food came and things seemed to be going well, until... The vegetarian asked me how I came about being here, my kids, where the fathers are, etc. I of course started having to explain myself and almost felt I had to defend myself. They both said, they can't really get any jobs, so they live off their husbands income. Which is fine if you can do that. I didn't make any comment. Then the vegetarian asked: What I did at the company I worked for. I told her and she gave me this really snotty look, because I told her I was an Executive Assistant. She then said to me "They'll hire anyone in that company.". I thought that was very rude. First of all, that is beyond true, so I defended myself telling her she's mistaken ( I worked as a recruiter their for awhile), they only take people with no less than a 2,0 average. She told me that she knew better because her HUSBAND worked their. I then told her that if her husband got hired then he must have had excellent credentials. She said he did, had a Masters, Ph'd and was one of the youngest to graduate from his class.
After that, I also explained to this woman that I taught. She said, do you have a teaching certificate? I said no, I didn't, but I teach for the district elementary and middle schools, the business school and for my company. It's going very well and I have never been asked for a teaching certificate, because I have experience in the field from other jobs that I had to train people in. She said, that was IMPOSSIBLE and basically called me a liar in my face. She told the doctors wife that she HAD to have a teaching certificate if she were to make it anywhere. I told her no, she didn't. She had to first learn the language and start teaching for a vocational school and work her way up. The rest will come on her own and if she still thinks she needs a certificate she can get one, but before spending thousands, she should first try it. They also both don't have any real jobs, because they don't know the language well enough and the jobs they do get aren't what they want. So this woman made me feel like a total idiot for having made it over here and forgetting that she's only lived here 3yrs and the other 2yrs and I've been here 10. This woman started almost an arguement and then I changed the subject and decided to ask about travel. Both women travel all over the world with their husbands, so I wanted to hear about that. I wished I had never of asked. :-(
I became so depressed with this womans bragging. She was in Vietnam and other parts of Asia for 3 months without her husband but living off his money. Then she was headed for travel throughout europe. The doctors wife was telling me that for the honey moon they did a trip around the world and the places that are already booked for this year, because her husband is hanging on an international medical education and has to therefore travel everywhere and she'll just tag along.
Now, I haven't been really anywhere, in the last 10yrs, because I am strapped for cash all the time. I did a few places that I am proud to say, but in reality it's no big deal compared to what normal people here travel. Since my Divorce, my X husband, who never took me anywher but Austria twice, traveled with his girlfriend EVERYWHERE. Thailand, Africa, Greece as a start and now he's in Argentina for 4wks and I haven't been able to even go anywhere outside of Germany in over 24hrs in almost over 2 years.
Before I forget they also commented on my loud voice, which I can't help, because I don't notice that and the restaurant was loud and the other women were speaking so low I almost had to wear an ear horn to hear them.
So, I was feeling really depressed and very upset. I told them that we should pay, because it was getting late. We were all paying our own, but the two ladies had a bottle of water together. The actually split that two dollar water down to the cents. It was almost embarrassing. The were hackling who was going to pay the 2 cents more. As I was going to leave, the Doctors wife (who was actually very nice and didn't say anything negative towards me), reminded me that I had told her we would go for a drink afterwards. I reluctantly agreed, because I KNEW if you put a drink inside of me, I was going to keep ordering more drinks. Not because I do this all the time, but because I had secretly wanted to visit my best friend at the bar due to being so upset and I wanted to drown out my sorrows.
REWINDING: We discussed over dinner and before on our phone calls having thanksgiving together. She invited me to come to her house. I said yes and she asked if I could get a Turkey and make something. The Turkey we would of divided up the price between us and the family. So we were set on having Thanksgiving and totally thrilled about it.
We got to the bar and she ordered a beer mixed with sprite (favorite drink in europe), I ordered a bacardi coke, should of ordered a beer, because I don't like beer. I kind of drank that a bit quick and ordered another. She started watching me, I felt like my mother controlling me, then I lit up my first cigarrette all night. It happens when I drink that I then crave a cig. This is a bar that is always filled with smoke, so then she starts waving the smoke away, even though I was making sure it wasn't near her. She said she had an allergy against smoke (hello? She goes to this bar all the time, she should know it's smoky). To be nice, I sat further away. BUT!! THEN MY FRIENDS CAME ALONG. They all smoke and they all drink. WE started to sit around liting up the cigarrettes and I started drinking more, because I was so upset. In 2 hrs, I had 4 Bacardi Cokes and 4 Cigarrettes. Then I was DRUNK. I almost NEVER drink so much, but it hit me worse because I just had been out of the hospital and was on an IV for a week with no food or liquid allowed. She said nothing about the drinks but she was watching and then she said to me, you already had 4 cigarrettes tonight, don't you think that's enough? I said she was right, so I quit. Shortly afterwards, she said she had to go and I told her that I was staying with my friend Maggie for the night, because I wasn't driving home anymore. We said good-bye that was it. I hadn't heard from her over a week and she no longer called me regarding Thanksgiving.
I know I was a serious claud in the end, being drunk was not the asnwer, somehow I would like to explain myself. I just don't know how and I am not even sure I want to apologize directly for the way I acted. I know she wasn't the reason for that womans behaviour, but at the same time, she did suddenly judge me and didn't even call her invitation off, just left me hanging. I did realize that she probably wouldn't contact me, so I never bought the turkey, nor did I make any plans for the kids to be babysat, on that part, no big deal, but it's just the whole fact and the situation. I would like to try and reconciliate, but would like some opinions if I should or shouldn't and how to go about it to at least get what's still bugging me off my chest. Should I, or should I just leave it and move on?

I would forget about it. Don't contact her. Both of those women were jealous of you in someway...jealous of you having a job and making it on your own. They felt the need to brag to reassure themselves that they are somehow better, but really they feel like unemployed wives who are waiting for life to happen. If you just met the doctor's wife one-on-one, you might have been friends. But, when three people meet, it almost never works out. The two that already know each other gang up on the third.
Write it off as one bad night. Like a bad date. If you had such a rotten time with a man, you wouldn't dream of calling him.
I agree, forget her. I would say differently if you all had been friends for some time and this happened, but this was basically your first time hanging out with this woman.
She acted as dreadfully as you may have, by not shutting the other one down.
Hugs
Tara
Oh my I would have reacted the same way and honestly I dont see that you behaved badly at all...you were yourself!!
Forget the vegetarian...maybe look up the Dr. wife later- after the holidays :)
AS to travel--- youve done more travel than alot of people.
Dont sweat it...the vegatarian sounds like a real snob to me. yuck
While I sympathize that you had such a bad night, I think you are taking their behavior way too personal and letting it upset you too much. I know that is natural and human, though, because they were very mean.
But I think that you should let them keep floating down the river like big terds - why scoop them up to convince them not to be terds? And let them go. It is their loss not to want to get to know you better or have an open mind to learn from someone else.
Enough done and said with them. YOu have your whole life to live!!