Imagine that you miraculously bought your own place in a resort town. Let it be small. And moved to live by the sea. And before that no one from your family was interested in your life. They did not ask how you are, whether you are alive and well. Why you have been working for five years and do not go on vacation, why you eat lean borscht.
It is clear that there are hospitable people who are happy to let anyone stay overnight. Only when someone gets cheeky and tries to live at the expense of others, it begins to stress. Where is the fine line when hospitality goes from wanting to kill someone, just to be alone with yourself in your own home?
Not always family and friends show up at the door of someone who has suddenly become rich or has bought a home in a beautiful place. But when someone I know has a cottage or a house near the sea, the pilgrimage to it does not stop for everyone who is not lazy to drag to the south.
Once Eva, who was suffering from shortness of breath, came to me. She had something heavy in her chest and felt as if everything inside was on fire. Obviously, she was examined, but the doctors couldn’t find anything. As it turned out, she was under constant stress and she herself had even stopped noticing it. The cause of the problem was right there on the surface…
The beginning was the purchase of an apartment. Eva had been foolish enough to give her mother a copy of the keys. At the time, she felt it was the right thing to do. Her mother lived four hours away from her daughter, but she wasn’t lazy and came to see her by train. Eva had to leave work to meet her mother.
To avoid this, she gave her mother a couple of keys and the problem seemed to be solved. At first all was well. But then mom started coming not alone, but with relatives, friends, even the neighbors. Eva, look at your life, what does poor Alla see, apart from her household? Let her stay with you. You have to return kindness for kindness. She looked after you when I was working.
Luda, Katya’s niece, is going to college, and she’ll stay with you until she finds a place to live, her mother and I have already agreed. Eva, Galya and Ira are coming to stay with you, she found a job near your place, till the repair work is finished, they will stay at your place.
Eve’s husband was usually on the payroll, so he never saw this flow of the eternal beggars of relatives and acquaintances. And Eva sincerely believed that she was doing the right thing, doing a good thing. Even though the city was not exactly big, but still her apartment benefited many, and her mother pleased everyone. Only she did it through her daughter, but she does not spend money herself. She did good with other people’s hands.
Eva continued to put up with her mother’s antics, huddling with her husband in one room until the flow of relatives and guests stopped in the other. She treated everyone, set the table, fed them properly. She even found a second job, since there was an acute shortage of money. And then came the quarantine, her husband stayed at home, without work, but the guests were not afraid of any illnesses. They came regularly and stayed even without asking.
The husband got tired of it all and told his wife: Either you take away her mother’s keys and forbid her to invite someone to visit us, or I divorce you.
It was difficult for Eva to decide, because her mother brought her up as a good daughter, but she did not want to leave her husband. So she decided to talk to her mother.
The mother, understandably, began to blame her daughter for her callousness, callousness, remembering her childhood years, how they nursed her, gave her treats, gave her their things, explaining that this is how the city had a negative effect on her, even tried to pretend to be ill, allegedly her daughter had driven her to a heart attack. She used all her reserves, manipulated, only her daughter was relentless.
The mother wouldn’t give up the keys and at the same time added that she no longer had a daughter! And she didn’t want to see her! The husband ended up changing the locks out of harm’s way. You never know what you can expect from uninvited guests. A few times some of them did come by for old times’ sake, but no one would open the door for them, as it is a rather thankless job to feed the endless relatives.
The woman was sorry that her relationship with her mother was ruined, she just sighed with her full breath. And relaxed, since there was now enough money. And she no longer felt any of the chest pains that had plagued her so much while she tried to be good. Pleasing her mother, while she tried to look better than she really was.
