Last night my mom called to ask me to do her a favor and wait for her furniture delivery on Thursday. My mom is great and I don't mind doing it, but I have plans to have lunch with my father on Thursday, and I haven't seen my dad in over a month, not even on father's day, so I said, "well, I have plans with dad." I also have a standing agreement with Jen to pick up our CSA delivery on thursdays, so if I did wait for my mom's furniture it would not only derail my plans w. my dad, but also mean that I had to do a lot of rushing uptown and downtown to meet all the deliveries and make it to work on time. Which I would have done, but again, not ideal, which i mentioned.

Now. Lets keep in mind I never said no to my mother's request. I just sort of hemmed and hawed and said, we'll I've got this other stuff, but it sounds like you're saying I have to do this pickup for you, so I will "but it fucks up my plans." were the exact words I used.

She didn't like that.

My mother sometimes accuses me of being cruel. That's the word. Cruel. Now. Maybe I could have used some more elegant language to express myself, but I don't think that pointing out that I, as a grown woman, who had made some plans already, was reluctant to break them is really cruel. And its not like I made these plans with casual acquaintances or something, like who gives a shit if you break them. Its a plan with my dad and a commitment to my girlfriend, people who I love. Which probably made it worse actually, cause if my mom was seeing it as a them over me thing, then I do seem like a shitball. But that wasn't it at all of course.

Whatever, the whole thing blew up and she was like, forget it, don't do me any favors. And I was like, gggrrrrrrrrrrr! What the fuck am I supposed to say? I felt awful, because I know I'm not cruel, and even if I were, not waiting for someone's furniture wouldn't be a good example of cruelness...but I feel bad that my mom feels and thinks that I'm hurting her, let alone on purpose. I love my mom and admire her and I want her to be happy and feel loved by me. But somehow I just don't express myself in a way that is perceived as loving. Or I do sometimes but not enough of the time? I don't know. It makes me feel shitty.