I have to get out... I don't know what else to do.
The 'roomates' have been discussing the idea of getting a dog lately... please keep in mind we have 3 FUCKING CATS
(Black clothes are nearly impossible in this home)
So yeah... they discuss... they don't ONCE ask me for my opinion... then yesterday their talking about it to the landlord (who happens to be my uncle.) and my mother says "You all 3 should sit down and talk about it." My grandmother says "All 3 who?" Sabrina says, "You me and Simi Nanny... remember, she lives here too." Nanny says, "Oh! I'm sorry dear, I forget sometimes."
So I think Great, we can sit down and talk... cause I'm not too keen on this idea... not at all.
I come home today and BOOM I have 60lbs of hound dog in my fucking living room.
Did we talk? NO
Did I voice my opinion? NO
Do I have the balls to say anything about it? *sighs* NO
Sometimes... I really hate my life... if things don't get better by my birthday you can all count down the New Year without me cause I'm jumping off a fucking bridge.
The 'roomates' have been discussing the idea of getting a dog lately... please keep in mind we have 3 FUCKING CATS
(Black clothes are nearly impossible in this home)
So yeah... they discuss... they don't ONCE ask me for my opinion... then yesterday their talking about it to the landlord (who happens to be my uncle.) and my mother says "You all 3 should sit down and talk about it." My grandmother says "All 3 who?" Sabrina says, "You me and Simi Nanny... remember, she lives here too." Nanny says, "Oh! I'm sorry dear, I forget sometimes."
So I think Great, we can sit down and talk... cause I'm not too keen on this idea... not at all.
I come home today and BOOM I have 60lbs of hound dog in my fucking living room.
Did we talk? NO
Did I voice my opinion? NO
Do I have the balls to say anything about it? *sighs* NO
Sometimes... I really hate my life... if things don't get better by my birthday you can all count down the New Year without me cause I'm jumping off a fucking bridge.
VIEW 7 of 7 COMMENTS
The problem with dealing with people is that most people allow themselves to be governed by emotion, and they expect everyone else to be goverened by emotion. Whenever somebody like that initiates a personal interaction, they go into it in some emotional state. That gives the other person one of three choices: they can empathize with the first person's emotional state, they can ignore it, or they can try to change it. The only way to garuntee that the interaction will go smoothly is for the second person to empathize with the first person's emotional state. If the second person ignores the first's emotional state or tries to change it, she (let's say) risks a confrontation. However, if empathizing with the first person's emotional state for the sake of a smooth interaction results in her not getting what she wants out of the interaction, that doesn't work in the long run either. If one person in the interaction occupies a position of authority over the other, that person always has an advantage in any interaction. If neither person has authority, the one with the more dominant personality always wins.
The solution: Don't fall for this f*cking trick. Take the other person's emotional state into account as a part of what they're trying to communicate to you and the driving force behind the words they're saying, but don't let it affect you. It might make the other person think you're ignoring their emotional state and that might draw them into a conflict with you, but you aren't ignoring their emotional state, so the conflict is all of their making. Conflict or not, the other thing it'll do is to give you a lot more dominant of a personality than they were expecting, and you level the field. That leaves you free to just do what you came here to do.
As long as you're paying your share of the rent, no individual has authority over you either. If they both agree and think that they can make such a decision by simple democratic majority, that still isn't fair to you, whether they realize it or not. You all went into your roommateship with an agreement, and a dog wan't part of it. That's not to say either that a dog was expressly NOT part of it (I'm guessing), but if it wasn't a part of it, before anybody changes any part of the agreement, you have to come to an agreement among you all. If they choose to get a dog by democratic majority anyway, and it wasn't expressly not part of the original agreement, you can't stop them, but you can at least make them understand that are making the conscious choice to make a negative impact on your living environment, that the un-agreed-upon negative impact is undermining the stauts of your roommateship, and that they made the conscious choice to do it anyway undermines the state of your friendship.
I'm getting a lot out of my new roommateship. People make a lot more sense now, but it's been disappointing to see that people are so easy to scientifically deconstruct once you know what you're looking at.