Of Money and Relationships

They say money can’t buy you love, nor happiness.. The best it can do is buy you pseudo love and pseudo happiness.. All that is true but also money can make you lose precious gems like nakama..
Well at least in my case..
There was a girl I really liked back and we hit it off on good footing but she left me and though I was given a shoddy reason that couldn’t hold water. The real reason though that I knew, was that she saw I didn’t have the amount of money that she wanted.. Too harsh, eh?.
Okay lemme tone down the story and take a different perspective. Two years back where I was working, one of our usual clients became friends with me. Well I even knew her place and twice she brought me cooked food to enjoy. Other times after closing shop I’d head to her place to deliver her purchases and we’d end up watching a movie and eating before I headed home.. Some of the purchases were either on high discount rates or on credit. She did tale her time to pay them all back though. But what ticked me off was she took something on credit and took over 6 months to pay back. I had to pay the business back with my own cash and follow up on her. Sadly, because of that, I lost her as a friend. Yeah I know don’t mix business and friendship. Also I wasn’t stupid, I knew she wanted us to be friends so that she could benefit but I naïvely thought that she had a good side, well that wasn’t the case. Though I don’t want to judge her and neither should you.
That isn’t an isolated case though, I’ve had quite a few other encounters along the same line. And all didn’t end happily ever after.
Well now you think that I am naïve and maybe it is true, however I prefer nakama over money.. It is the little things in life that are enjoyable and that is what I treasure so if money will cause friction between me and nakama then I’d rather not have money.. I hear some of you say that in case don’t help out with money in the first place- well there are two big hurdles with that.
First, I am naïve and because of that I love helping people out. When someone comes to me for help, I actually I’m very happy. They say that humans need to be loved, but for me in my case, the feeling of being needed supersedes love. I’m not saying that I help to be recognised, on the contrary I prefer doing things incognito. That is so because I am very bad when it comes to handling and receiving praise and gratitude. I’m an introvert hence I’m an objective type of person. Truthfully, most of the time when I help out it isn’t because I care much, only because I can.. Sounds contradictory, right?.
Secondly, I am a very lousy liar especially when asked a direct question. Even if I lie it will be pretty obvious to all and sundry so I can’t lie that I can’t help you.
The lending part isn’t an issue for me, it is the debt recovery part that is. If it is my fellow Martian I can easily, ask for it and in case things get ugly then a few punches will suffice. After that we resume our daily routines. However, if it is one of the Venetian species then that brings myriad of challenges.
When I lend cash to the Venetians I usually write it off as a bad debt for though they always promise to pay it back, they never do. I don’t know whether when they say that they will repay and they don’t, do they think about the effects? For me my trust in then corrodes and I can never lend them money again. Funny enough they never do get back to asking me for help again. Well there are three exceptions to that story.
First, my mother is one of those who love saying they’ll pay me back. However, she never does and yet she still has the audacity to ask me for more and claim she’ll pay it back. Sigh, I hate that cycle but because she is my mother, I never bother thinking about it.
Next is the only Venetian that I know keeps her word. When she asks for cash from me I will actually move heaven and earth to help her. She is trustworthy when it comes to money matters. Incidentally she is a very close friend I made eight years back.
The last exception is another friend I made two to three years back. Well she trusts me a lot though I wonder why. Well my first approach was I had a crush on her, but she had already been taken by someone else so I gave up. However, out of her insight and intuition she kept me close as a friend. She views me as her elder brother always there to help her out. Though I usually act aloof and cold to her she still cherishes me. Anyway she is the only one who is truthful when asking for money, she usually tells me that “I might not be able to pay back any time soon”.. I like her brutal honesty and because of that I will help her out.
Maybe I should just get back to my previous state where I at least could say the truth that I have no money/can’t help out.
Until next time, signing out.