“Wanna Watch Scary Movie 3?” Or the Paradox of Compassion
My two current flatmates are 31-year-old Americans whom moved across the pond to be closer to their girlfriends. This, in and of itself I think, sounds alternatively ludicrous and hopelessly romantic. Tom says that all his old co-workers cooed their little brains out over the lengths he went to be near Tanya, in Dresden, by moving to Prague to teach English.
Tom and Tanya, for all Tom’s craziness and inability to shut up, are a great couple. You can see the way they fold into each other, wrapping themselves in the blankets of each other’s loquacious natures. Though drastic, Tom made the right decision cutting off 8 hours of his travel time to see “the love of his life.”
Paul is his antithesis.
You can see the wobble in his house of cards by the weakly formed lattices I present: he’s 31 and Taiwanese, his girlfriend 20 and Dutch; they met in a chatroom; they’ve seen each other only once in person, for a period of two weeks. It should come to little surprise that Paul got the hatchet soon thereafter moving to Prague. This, unfortunately, beset total devastation on flatmate Paul, compounded by the fact that Paul is struggling in the TEFL course.
Now I like Paul. Paul is more or less a nice guy, a guy who certainly didn’t deserve the IM dumping he received. Having been there before, I more than sympathize with the dude. But the problem that follows for me is this: Where do you draw the line for compassion?
Because although I like Paul, I receive no stimulation from being around him—intellectually, conversationally, entertainment, etc. We have almost nothing in common, and if coincidence had not struck as flatmates, we would never have struck up much of any relationship, but we bummed around town a couple times together and eventually I became his most sound source in the city.
Now before I sound like a selfish asshole, let me line up my defense, please, give me so much—I wish the best for Paul. I’ve gone on hour-long walks to help him sort his head on the matter. I feel for him, I really do. But the fact of the matter is, I don’t really want to spend time with him.
The evidence against: Last Saturday Paul had two friends he had met the previous year visit him from Brno (the Czech Republic’s second biggest city). After his shower he put on a bathing suit (which he sleeps in), and suggested that his friends watch a movie with him. His first two suggestions were the Chronicles of Narnia and Scary Movie 3. Not exactly Czech chick flicks.
Afterwards he bragged, actually bragged to Tom and I, “It was pretty sweet that I slept with two Czech girls this weekend.”
Tom was having nothing of it. “But you didn’t do anything did you? With either of them?”
“No. But it was still pretty sweet!” Yeah, welcome to 8th grade, Paul, good luck copping a feel. He’ll also talk haltingly through a chunk of exposition than stare at me expectantly, or say, “What do you think of that?” He’s kind of like the puppy that starts following you home from school, except not a puppy, and not particularly cute otherwise, and he won’t bark when you ask him. And also he’s a particularly flatulent dog (Ok, Paul is not flatulent).
Oh, and: chews with his mouth open; slightly racist; doesn’t like hippies.
Look, suffice to say, Paul and I ain’t best buds. We cannot pass the time yakking about sports or books or movies or or or or etc—and now he’s suggesting we take a trip to Vienna. A 5 hour train ride back and forth with Mr. Chen, the inability to go to a bar with a guy who doesn’t drink, offering him a backboard to hit against yet receiving nothing…no thanks. But I feel compassion for him in his time of need. But what, WHAT, do you do when you want to help someone but don’t enjoy their company? How do you buoy their flagging feelings, or do you let them sink into an abyss of depression? Where do you draw the line between someone else’s interests and your own?
I’m not sure how many people I’ve even given access to this blog, but if ye have a suggestion, feel free to drop a comment in the box, ye mateys.
Tom and Tanya, for all Tom’s craziness and inability to shut up, are a great couple. You can see the way they fold into each other, wrapping themselves in the blankets of each other’s loquacious natures. Though drastic, Tom made the right decision cutting off 8 hours of his travel time to see “the love of his life.”
Paul is his antithesis.
You can see the wobble in his house of cards by the weakly formed lattices I present: he’s 31 and Taiwanese, his girlfriend 20 and Dutch; they met in a chatroom; they’ve seen each other only once in person, for a period of two weeks. It should come to little surprise that Paul got the hatchet soon thereafter moving to Prague. This, unfortunately, beset total devastation on flatmate Paul, compounded by the fact that Paul is struggling in the TEFL course.
Now I like Paul. Paul is more or less a nice guy, a guy who certainly didn’t deserve the IM dumping he received. Having been there before, I more than sympathize with the dude. But the problem that follows for me is this: Where do you draw the line for compassion?
Because although I like Paul, I receive no stimulation from being around him—intellectually, conversationally, entertainment, etc. We have almost nothing in common, and if coincidence had not struck as flatmates, we would never have struck up much of any relationship, but we bummed around town a couple times together and eventually I became his most sound source in the city.
Now before I sound like a selfish asshole, let me line up my defense, please, give me so much—I wish the best for Paul. I’ve gone on hour-long walks to help him sort his head on the matter. I feel for him, I really do. But the fact of the matter is, I don’t really want to spend time with him.
The evidence against: Last Saturday Paul had two friends he had met the previous year visit him from Brno (the Czech Republic’s second biggest city). After his shower he put on a bathing suit (which he sleeps in), and suggested that his friends watch a movie with him. His first two suggestions were the Chronicles of Narnia and Scary Movie 3. Not exactly Czech chick flicks.
Afterwards he bragged, actually bragged to Tom and I, “It was pretty sweet that I slept with two Czech girls this weekend.”
Tom was having nothing of it. “But you didn’t do anything did you? With either of them?”
“No. But it was still pretty sweet!” Yeah, welcome to 8th grade, Paul, good luck copping a feel. He’ll also talk haltingly through a chunk of exposition than stare at me expectantly, or say, “What do you think of that?” He’s kind of like the puppy that starts following you home from school, except not a puppy, and not particularly cute otherwise, and he won’t bark when you ask him. And also he’s a particularly flatulent dog (Ok, Paul is not flatulent).
Oh, and: chews with his mouth open; slightly racist; doesn’t like hippies.
Look, suffice to say, Paul and I ain’t best buds. We cannot pass the time yakking about sports or books or movies or or or or etc—and now he’s suggesting we take a trip to Vienna. A 5 hour train ride back and forth with Mr. Chen, the inability to go to a bar with a guy who doesn’t drink, offering him a backboard to hit against yet receiving nothing…no thanks. But I feel compassion for him in his time of need. But what, WHAT, do you do when you want to help someone but don’t enjoy their company? How do you buoy their flagging feelings, or do you let them sink into an abyss of depression? Where do you draw the line between someone else’s interests and your own?
I’m not sure how many people I’ve even given access to this blog, but if ye have a suggestion, feel free to drop a comment in the box, ye mateys.
posted by Avimaan @ 1:36 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home