Dear Sawhole,I need your wisdom!
My girlfriends and I are close, our babies are all around the same age and we've never had any issues. Sure disagreements, but never all out scrag fighting ... Until now.
One girlfriend has decided to carry on like a right porkchop, call everyone downright nasty names and delete us all off Facebook. Yes, she sure showed us! Now through one girlfriend, she is insisting that we all her contact her if we want to know what the problem is. Me? I feel like responding to her highschool antics by decorating her house with toilet paper!
HELP!
Anon
P.P.S: You rock!
Dearest Madame Mystery,
Thank you for sharing your dilemma with me. I have been spending my time picking small bits of fluff off Mrs Woog's clothing while she was away so I am thankful for some real work.
Firstly, your frenemy needs to pull her head in (Australian for get with the program). Real friends are too important to shaft, let alone on Facebook. This is how I see it thanks to Good Weekend writer Ginny Dougary: "If you are lucky enough...to meet, as I was, someone when you are young who seems like the perfect mate, albeit with no romantic attachment, cherish the friendship...If you work at it, a friendship that starts in your 20s can become one of the most sustaining and constant forces in your life." I think of Mrs Woog in that way.
I learnt most of my friendship conflict resolution skills in Mr Groth's room at Lithgow High School. The alpha females in our 'group' would herd us into the classroom, which had a giant fishtank on the wall, to bash out our issues. Usually something about boys, periods or nasty comments. In fact, the room with the fishtank featured in one of my friend's novels. Her name is Alyssa Brugman and you should buy her books. Seriously buy the books now!
Anyway, besides the fish tank, I learnt from the alphas. One was very fond of saying: "Don't patronise me!" - a line which I have used to good effect over the years. The best use was at The Big Wick, a Jabba the Hutt type I was forced to work with who enjoyed taunting me with: "Come back when you've got a real story, SawHole!"
One day he made the mistake of saying my shirt was see-through so I grabbed a dictionary, hurled it at his head and said: "Don't patronise me, Big Wick!" Later I was called into the Chief of Staff's makeshift office and he said the next time I threw such a thing at Big Wick, do not miss.
Obviously your frenemy is not a Good Weekend reader and has taken to defriending and nasty names and abuse. So she is a passive aggressive abuser in my book. I think one passive aggressive turn deserves another. Ignore. Ignore. Ignore. Seriously she needs to have a good hard look at herself. Most friendships can survive a slight. Give the issue some time and air and it will almost certainly blow over.
However, it seems she has gone a bridge too far, as Kevin Rudd would say. I am not sure this friendship can be saved. She is a one-woman bomber intent on destruction.
The other thing I would suggest is that if her behaviour is so out of character she could have some kind of mood disorder or something else is going on in her life. Just a thought but I would stay away for the moment and have you toilet paper at the ready.
Cheers Dears,
SawHole
Unprofessional Agony Aunt
Sidekick of Mrs Woog
www.woogsworld.com
