First of all, happy Sunday!!!! Don’t you just love Carol Channing? She was such a ray of sunshine. Every hipster in L.A. would kill to wear that hat to brunch today!

Working through a lesson here:

I have a friend here in Brooklyn that I’ve known since before I moved here. I’ve told him to take a total of four hikes in the past but he keeps coming back. I’ve suggested the hikes because he has no perspective and complains about things he shouldn’t. And nothing is ever his fault. It’s that he’s unlucky. Eventually every conversation he has gets slathered in self-pity. Every time I’ve taken him back, I tell him I can’t deal.

Last night he tells me he’s being evicted from this giant studio in Sunset Park because his landlord needs the space for the new baby. He’s had this place for three years and rent has never gone up. In NYC they call that a miracle.

I give him ten different solutions. I tell him to process his feelings and then get in a good mood and tackle this opportunity as best he can.

This morning I’m having a lovely time. I wake up, make breakfast, sit down to eat. And he texts me with more of the same, starting off with, “Too bad you found a roommate.”

So this time I finally say, “I’m the friend you come to for solutions. I don’t commiserate.” You’ll know this first hand if you’ve ever come to me with a problem. I with empathize and show compassion, but I’ve never been much for the ‘misery’ part of commiserating.

I’ve had friends in Arizona text me to complain about the rain and how they don’t want to drive to Target in the rain. I don’t even know what to say to that.

I already have enough misery of my own. At the moment I’m looking into PTSD therapy for all the anger and rage I’m experiencing before I turn into the Hulk and take out everyone with me.

Plus, this guy’s problem is that he wants to keep paying $1600 for a giant studio and I was just at housing court on Friday watching a schizophrenic man trying to advocate for himself to an overtaxed but empathetic judge because he was actually locked out of his place. People got it rough all over. I don’t have time for problems. Solutions, on the other hand…I got all day.

Anyway, he first said he wasn’t really complaining. I don’t think he knows he’s doing it. He just loves misery that much (he’d win the trophy at Jewish camp for complaining). And then I said, fine. But I’m trying to have a lovely Sunday. And I only have so much psychic energy today.

I hope he got it. I’m trying to enforce boundaries so I can be a good friend, I don’t go off the edge suddenly after way too much biting of my tongue, and still have energy to deal with everything I’m going through myself.

I’m migrating from WordPress to Wix this weekend. Say a prayer for me.

And if you ever want me to stop caring about what you’re saying, tell me how life’s not fair. No one ever promised you “fair.” There is no manager at the life buffet you can complain to about the portions or the price. You get what you get and everything else is up to you. I don’t complain about fair and there were a lot of things I didn’t choose to be. But I’m trying my hardest to make it work. If I see you doing any less, I’m not about to carry your burden on top of mine.