Friendship delimma

So, okay, it sounds like you and your friend can still be friends. What will be the relationship with your husband if you don't quit punishing him may be a different story. You didn't catch them in any particular act, you know.

Sorry to be negative here, but he is aware of your feelings by now, but
enough is enough.

Calm down, Roger -- I haven't punished him *that* bad! heehee

Morganwood, I appreciate and agree with your point of view in regard to referring to a friend as a sister or brother. Sorry if I got a little defensive in response to your questions (which were good ones).

I do consider a sister and don't want to dump her, she's loyal and always ready to help with a problem, which is hard to find in a friend. I guess I'm just trying to figure out how to proceed with handling this situation. I think she needs to learn that her actions affect more people than just herself, and that she needs to think about what she says before saying it.

Your comment, " If she refuses to stop, what is she saying about her feelings for you as a friend." makes me think. My husband swears that he made a few comments about the dildo conversation, like "You're still talking about that stuff?" or "I'm gonna kill you if you don't stop talking about that!" and it apparently seemed to egg her on, somehow. He also was angry with her for teasing one of his single friends who's had a crush on her for years, and when he asked her to stop, she would say "No, he likes it!" And wouldn't respect my husband's wishes.

So, hmmmmm....I don't know what to think.

I haven't been angry with a friend like this in a long time -- this is tough.

Why not go straight forward with it: (to use your last line)
Call, or sit with, Ramona (always wanted to meet a woman named Ramona, who carried a whip) and simply say "I haven't been this angry with a friend in a long time and I don't like the feeling."

"I'm really upset with your behavior at the party and somewhat offended." "What can we do so it doesn't happen again?"

"You're too good a friend to be angry with!"

Let her solve the problem. Especially if you don't know what to do. The "What do you mean?" reply won't do. She knows, especially since both you and your husband spoke to her. You don't have the problem, it's her problem.

Nah, LibertyD, you haven't scared me off.

Your friend, however.....hmmm. Well, if you ever decide to ask us to the same gathering, don't be too surprised if I turn out to be the guest who takes her aside smilingly and tells her to shut the f**k up. (Subtly, of course! ) I tend to be very protective of my friends, and if I could tell she was upsetting you, I would stop her.

Ramona with a whip, huh? lol

I like your suggestion (along with everyone else who has encouraged me to take the high road), and I think that's the only way to solve the problem.

Thanks for your advice!

Oh good!

It would really be great to have you join us next time!

I wrote what I thought was a long thoughtfelt response to this topic this morning and about line 39 my cursor froze. Sigh.

Let's see if I can even begin to summarize.

* I want to separate party hogging behavior from the fact that this sometimes involves sexual imagery over a long period of time. It can happen with other kinds of party hoggers. Theater people, for example.

* As life goes on, one learns to care for all the guests..that they have a good time. Is half the room never getting to talk? (Because they are listening to suzy or because they have no one interested in what they might have to say?}

Many people are more interesting than first assumed once you get them talking. This tends not to happen when people talk about dildos for eight hours.

Your friend was out of bounds that night. It was your housewarming and birthday. You and hub were inexperienced in keeping the party yours. This is not the end of the world.

Your friend may have a longer term problem, but let us hope not. At the least she is quite the attention seeker, aka needy. Needy tends not to look outward.
People who tend not to look outward tend not to get loved much back, and so on. She was thoughtless in her needy way. Whether you care enough for her to foster her friendship is not for us to say. But to the extent you are her friend, you might try to explore all this, or suggest she talk to someone in the know, like a therapist.

She messed up your party, and is messing up her days.

Osso -- stupid computer! Thanks for taking the time to summarize what you lost, I really appreciate it.

I think I did an okay job of caring for all the guests -- with the exception of my failure to take my friend aside and ask her to change the subject. Maybe one of my problems is that because I worked for years in the restaurant biz, I was overly concerned with keeping their glasses full and ashtrays clean and the shrimp stocked rather than keeping track of what was actually going on? That damned servant in me will never leave!

I also managed to steer some of the wimpy insiders (it was kind of steamy outdoors, that night) to the outer fringe, which was a little more lively and offered more opportunity to ignore Ms X.

Maybe the fact that this one was pre-planned for more than a day had something to do with it. Pre-planning, I've found, sometimes leads to a lot of high expectations. And those who were joining us for the first time were the ones I was really worried about, but next time I'll be sure to get them here spur-of-the-moment so there's no risk of formality. Everyone else is used to helping themselves and feeling at home, and so I think that I also threw people off by trying to make it to nicey-nice. We're not like that, around here.

And even though I stooped earlier to whining about how it was "my birthday" and "my homewarming" (bad me) honestly it was about everyone who was here. As with most social gatherings, there are also the little "asides" -- like it was my mom-in-law's last chance to chill out and forget about my dad-in-law's upcoming cancer surgery -- and my dad and my aunt haven't really spoken in 30 years, except for the occasional Christmas, and so it was special that they were getting to know (and like) each other again. So, despite the fact that I've sounded like a selfish brat about this, and still admit that I was queen in my own mind that night, it was special in other ways for other guests, as well.

And as far as sexual imagery goes, a little of that never hurts anything, it's just a matter of going (way) too far. Subtilty is key, IMHO.

Well, I'm feeling a little less primordal (thank god). The glass is half-full -- life is good -- really!

Thanks again, Osso!

Just thought I'd let you guys know that "Ramona" called. She said she felt bad about the dildo talk but didn't think it was offensive. I admitted I should have said something, but told her that hubby said that he *did* say something to her about it -- and she said that she thought he was just intimidated by the sex toys and thought it was funny to keep bothering him with it.

She in turn was angry that we thought it inappropriate to tease hubby's friend (publicly and loudly -- about which I did hear hubby tell her to shut up) because "he likes it."

Anyway, I wasn't in the mood for an arguement and just told her that when she's ready to talk about it a little more calmly, to give me a call. Maybe we're just moving in different directions.

(sigh)

Thanks for the update!

Yeah, different directions happens, especially if one friend's married and one isn't. Even if that's the case, could be temporary, and then find yourselves on the same wavelength again later on.

Glad she called, at least.

(Why did she feel bad about it if it wasn't offensive?)

She felt bad that I found it offensive and that I got so upset over it. (I think that's what she meant)

Saw a senior citizen today with a shirt that I thought fit this thread:

"You've got a lifetime to be obnoxious, why not take a few minutes off for me?"

At least you talked. Step one is over!!

By the way, others have mentioned that there is an undercurrent of anger at your husband, but another undercurrent I notice is that I think this is more the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back than some isolated incident that came out of nowhere. Your latest "different directions" comment reinforces that. I think you may just feel that you have moved on while she has stayed in the same place, and this incident may have just crystallized a lot of those things you were already feeling. Not so much a fault thing, as falling out of sync.

Anyway, just a thought.

I like that one, Morganwood!


Sozobe, I think you're exactly right. And for the record, the husband anger wasn't nearly as strong -- like Roger said, I didn't catch them doing anything. It was more irritation, than anger (never even raised my voice )

And you're right about the straw -- I didn't want to go into a bunch of unrelated history here, but you're right. It makes me sad, but I think little sis is at the point where she needs friends her own age to experiment with life a little -- and I'm at a different stage of experimentation.

Sounds like this freindship may just fade away (Or go to a different level)
without a big to do.

Sounds like maybe that's what you really want.

Something like this(her behavior and your reaction) just doesn't come up out of the blue.

Hi fealola -- yeah, I hate to admit it, but I think you're right.

LibertyD, never did say "I'm glad to meet you!".
I am.

Thanks, Morganwood! It's been a great pleasure meeting you, too!

Thank you for posting the followup, Liberty! Ah, well, we often move on from people, but it we can keep it from being some kind of cataclysmic scenario, then there is room to go back and laugh five years later when you run into each other. It is hard to keep dozens of best friends, and after a longish life, you can care about a lot of people. Not all of them have to be the closest.

You like her, in part, for her bravado. And you see where that bravado is unthoughtful. She can surely still be in your life, if you end up wanting that, but it would be hard to always follow her zoning in on people,

A host isn't responsible for everybody's behaviour. But general comfort, I think there should be an effort to work for that. I am not talking about you, I think you really tried, but just talking out loud about whether having an event is presenting a neutral ground or more than that.

I hear myself sounding like a priss, which I am not at all. Just thinking about all this as I type.

You don't sound like a priss...and that's a good point about an event presenting a neutral ground or not. I guess I'm spoiled with my fabulous group of family and friends, and honestly have had the luxury of neutral ground, without even trying (they're just neutral kind of folks). So, I just assumed that it would be the same this time, only with a few extra people and lots of flowers to add to our fun.

But you know, the food was good and the wine was good and the scenery was sublime, and so from here on out I'm just going to think about that -- and that there was fun to be had outside of her vocal range. I got some genuine complements and thank you's on the event as well.