Enough is enough..

I've had it up to *here* with flatmate issues, really.

One has to leave brown muddy foot prints all over the bathroom floor while another has to insult me to my face on my birthday and walk away. One has to lecture me on how I'm being done a favor with the immense advantage my living arrangement provides while another has to do an unanticipated turnaround from close friend to cold foe in a matter of minutes.

And for all that people say about how *scary* I am, not once have I had the courage to stand up to one of them and tell them they were being unfair or unkind, curt without reason or just plain weird.

We're usually like that. The bitches that bark but can't bite.

We holler and make ourselves heard in every work forum. We earn the titles that suggest harshness, cut throat attitude and a lack of heart. We're easy to judge and *figure* out. We're the ones who react instantly. Who lack tact ever so often.

And yet we'll put up with all kinds of crap from the people who don't deserve to be put up with. Instead of asking them to shut up and take a hike, or to behave like a polite and decent human being, we'll meekly listen, assuming that being a pushover in this situation is making up for being a bitch otherwise.

And with that last curt, bordering on polite email from my flattie, I was done. We've recently figured out a way to convey our feelings to one another without getting emotional. It's called email. I tell her to keep the dishes cleaned and at the corner of the kitchen. She asks me to leave my shoes neatly stacked outside the house. It keeps the emotion out of what can become a stupid emotional fight between 2 women. I appreciate it. That and the fact that she doesn't ever hold a grudge. It's a contrast vs. anything I've faced earlier.


And yet today I reached official breaking point. Our last few emails stayed civil, and yet the insinuations kept piling on. Each time I told myself to put up with it coz it's just a matter of some months until I move out, and I kept feeling worse about being such a pushover.

But today, I wrote off a 3 page letter telling her exactly how I felt. About how, sorry but, she was just wrong about somethings. Without getting emotional about a single thing.

The Penguin was SO proud of it. We almost decided to put it up here for how well it was written :) and then decided maybe it was too mean to do that. So we didn't. But I read my letter like 10 times. And felt good with every single read. For how, once in my life, I'd actually stood up to someone outside work without chickening out.

(No one at work will ever understand this part of me that carries guilt so easily. So I don't expect any cheers from them. But close friends know how I'll live with being miserable coz of things said to me by people and yet not say anything until I've reached breaking point. So if you feel like going all "haha, you? chicken?" then you're just not one of those people)

For now, I just wanted to put it out here. Ms. Tic stood up for herself. And she's a proud girl for it.