DODGERS OFF-TOPIC Thread

i have a personal dilemma i don't know what to do with
a friend of more than 35 years recently lost his mom. neighborhood mom. loved by everyone. real sweet lady
she had been sick for a long time so none of us really got to see her
but she was at my wedding and he has really been a close friend for a lot of years. hard to describe how close we are.
he was strong for me when i lost my father 20 years ago, just happened to be days before my wedding
i talked to him over the last few weeks as they were making decisions and offered my space or home for any type of services etc.
he said he wasn't sure if he was going to do a service and i was shocked
i mean we say a few words when we bury our dogs and its just the right thing to do right?
i know its not my family or my business but i know the whole story and we might as well be brothers
these awesome people adopted him and his siblings as infants and loved and raised them as their own
for years we were street urchin fuck ups and they stood by him and encouraged him
he has done well for himself and has a high city job making over 200k a year as well as a nice family w two kids of his own
he has always been a little tight w money and it served him well w deferred comp etc and i have always been proud of him as a man
but when he called and said he was going to have lunch at marie calendars for his mom i was stunned
i couldn't go. i was embarrassed and ashamed and could not envision myself sitting in that shithole of a restaurant looking at him.
i lied and called him last week leaving a message about a late night, didn't get the message blah blah
and when he didn't call back i knew he was pissed at me and probably rightly so
my mom and my kid say i need to tell him how i feel about it and i want to but think it will have a good chance of being the end of the relationship
and the truth is i think it might be anyway because i have lost considerable respect for him
can't stand people who make money their god
i really fucking hate that
like i said i have no idea what to do with this

 

Sorry to hear. My dog isn't but a couple months away from that same horrible fate.

 

Thanks for your well wishes everyone. Really appreciate it.

 

You know people and personalities better than I do I'm sure but I'd say call him and apologize. Like Irish kinda said, people deal with death in different ways. Personally, the death of my moms mom wasn't a huge blow... What was a huge blow was seeing my mom in absolute pieces. Just tried to comfort her as well as I can. He could be a mess internally, who really knows.

 

i did call and apologize it was just a lie is all. i wasn't sure what to next since i'm pissed off at him. you treated your dog better. but thanks for the advice guys. I'm just going to continue to give it distance i guess.

 

All I can offer is this: I have been going to bereavement counseling since my wife died, almost 3 years now. What I have learned utmost is that everyone is different... there are a hundred different ways others grieve and what they do may seem odd in the wake of it. But it is all acceptable, and your admittance and apology was healthy and to be commended. You have done the right thing, and your tack now is just to wait for the result of your sincerity.
It takes a better person to do what you did, and if there is karma, then it will be OK in the end. It could take time, but human nature is deeply flawed.
The distance you propose is a good path right now, I would say.
You can only be in charge of honoring her in your own world, with your own special form, and seldom does it appear mutual and similar with another's.
This is something I've come to accept as fact with my therapy, even though I would be at the opposite end of the spectrum if it were me.
Although it is hurtful and confusing to you, there is no right and wrong.

 

i absolutely don't want to project my emotional response onto his grief. its just really hard because i know the situation so well and without a doubt this is about his cheap money loving ass.
i made a decision this morning, early morning since i can't sleep lately, and i am going to go through old pictures and find the one i like most of his mom and get it framed and deliver it to his dad. fuck him. and if he pursues it he's going to get an ear full. maybe because he is adopted he somehow doesn't see his family as his actual family idk. but thats just bullshit. we take care of our own. fuck at least go to a good restaurant if you're going to go cheap. if the guy was on ebt i would understand.

 

thanks for thinking about it and the comments boys
for me the low road would be to hit him head on and bash him for not caring enough about his aging and dying parents to take care of them
i have never understood how people can put money ahead of that no matter how complicated their relationships are
i don't know many that aren't including my own
i would love to take that high road you speak of and think i could traverse it but i know myself too well
at the slightest trigger i will say more than i want to and so i am continuing to search for answers and keeping a distance
its growth for me to understand even this much as my life has always been finding the quick solution to any problem and sometimes there just isn't one

 

Diablo Buddy, you've got some real friends here at DSP and the last page of replies offer many nuggets of wisdom worthy of your consideration.

I can feel for your shoes as I lost my dad earlier this summer and while he was a no account womanizer who couldn't keep his dick in his pants he was still my father. OK he walked out on my Mom leaving her with 4 kids to raise and without a backward glance, then married an 18 year old half his age and then retired as soon as she managed to earn a decent living. Lived the retired house hubby life for decades. We had no contact with him for years. My kid brother a decade younger refused to even acknowledge he existed to his wife.

Well cancer caught up to him and he died. And his wife invited everyone, including my Mom, to an Irish wake back east but my kid Bro couldn't care less, whether he could afford to go or not, he was simply not interested. At all. The womenfolk tried all manner of brow beating and coercion but got nowhere, he blew off the entire event. It was his loss. Everyone else attended and among the highlights was his wife thanking my Mom for being so gracious, never saying a single harsh word for all those years when there were ample opportunities to do so. Touching.

I got to see cousins and uncles and aunts and people that I hadn't seen in forever while drinking his favorite scotch and saying a few kind words about learning some of life's lessons and not knowing I'd learned until much much later. That's kind of how it goes it seems, so don't let too much time go by before the learning begins. We each walk in our own shoes.

My kid brother? Nothing. No interest at all. As far as he cared I was his dad since I was the eldest and helped raise him. He didn't want anything more and didn't care one iota to give anything more either. At all. It's his loss but it was his choice.

It may be that your buddy was pinching pennies for a 'memorial lunch' or not, maybe Marie Calendar's was her favorite place... who knows... but it doesn't matter. His mom = his memorial. But don't put yourself in a place where you're judging him harsh based upon your world because he lost his mom and now he's lost his long time friend.

I knew both of your parents fairly well... drank beer with your dad numerous times and attended your mom's recent 90th birthday party... dude you have REALLY great peeps but not everyone gets measured on that scale. So cut whatever slack is necessary and call your buddy. Get over how he chose to remember her. That's his issue. The lunch didn't matter to her, she was already gone, but if you want to keep the friend then YOU need to make the effort to keep the friend. Or not.

Time heals all wounds and vice versus. The upper road travels well and the mirrors are more forgiving...

 

Whut he said!