How do you follow the dictates of Christ and love the neighbor who steals from you and lies to you without becoming a doormat and encouraging more of the same?
The answer to that question is that it's the wrong question.
It's the wrong question because it assumes a causal relationship between facts. The truth is that we have no power to cause another person to act differently, to be better. We can only make sure we leave a path open for a change of heart, while protecting ourselves as much as possible without putting up so many walls we impede the possibility of repentance.
This topic has been circulating in my mind because I have had to fire the young housekeeper (the daughter of a friend of mine) after only a couple of weeks of work. Because of my growing inabilities, due to physical issues, I really need someone to do the cleaning and garbage duty. Medicaid approved me for a special Medicaid program that would pay for a housekeeper to take care of the things at home that I am not able to do on a regular basis JUST before the Covid virus shut us all down.
Knowing her family and hoping to help them get through a hard time while also helping myself, I hired the girl who had just graduated college but had lost her restaurant job.
My experiences with this girl were nightmarish and bizarre. After all of the incomprehensible, crazy-making weird things she did, ultimately it only mattered that she did the two things I can't abide because, while I can tolerate and work with someone of limited skill or a mind that has trouble processing information, I can't tolerate stealing and lies, which is what she did. And she lied in a way that, if I were to even pretend to believe her, I would have to deny the reality of my own eyes and ears.
[PLEASE NOTE: In a recent conversation, subsequent to the initial publication of this post, the ersatz step-father of this girl has stated unequivocally that she did not steal anything and she is not a thief. "Someone else" is responsible, according to him, even though I have told him that no one else came into my apartment to do this. Whether she took these items, intending to steal, or she destroyed them and hid the evidence, the result is the same - ESPECIALLY since she is lying about all of it. I told her that if she accidently broke something, she wouldn't be punished. No one has to indemnify their work to be free of all accidents and mistakes - but she stuck to the lies. She has no idea what happened to these items, according to her.]
A really alarming incident happened when she was tasked with watering the 8 potted plants I have outside my patio. As with all projects, I asked her if she would like to do this, and she said "yes," so I showed her where the hose was curled on the patio and told her where to turn on the water around the corner. I heard her turn on the water, but when I checked her work later ALL of the potted plants were dry as a bone, the bird bath was empty, there was no trace of water in the dirt or on the patio, and the hose had CLEARLY not moved from where it had been curled for the last week.
The dirt and dust that had accumulated around the curls of the hose had not been disturbed. The hose was bone dry. The patio, where the hose typically leaks, was bone dry. The plants were bone dry. The bird bath was bone dry. I thought I was in a Felini film. It was just bizarre.
I wondered if the girl was on drugs or was she insane? Did she IMAGINE that she had watered the plants, when all she had actually done was turn on the water to the hose? I wondered if she thought that the water would magically be transported THROUGH THE AIR to the plants, or was she just piddling around, goofing off and distracted? Did she imagine that there was some kind of underground watering system? I had to question her about her method.
When I asked her why the plants were dry, she said that she just waters the roots - like her mother does. I said, "Okay, but how did you water them? Did you pick up the hose?" She said YES, that she HAD! I asked her which setting she used on the nozzle, and she claimed to use the one that was already there! What the heck????
I was stunned. This girl was resolutely spinning a fantastic yarn, while all visible evidence screamed that she was lying. [This would later turn out to be her typical modus operandi. I would explain a job, set her loose, ask her if it had been done, she would say "yes," but when I checked on it later, it was NOT DONE! Sometimes she had done the OPPOSITE of what she'd been instructed to do. More about that later.]
My stress level ratcheted up considerably. I had hired the daughter of a friend who proceeded to do extremely outlandish things, but I didn't feel I could fire her so soon after engaging her services. The girl had told me several times that her wages were going toward the rent on her family's apartment, and I KNOW that things are "tight" for them because the mother got fired a few months ago, the step-father figure has a career that relies upon projects that come and go. The Covid-19 virus has depressed the economy to the point where these kind of jobs are much less frequent. They were grappling with some serious survival issues. I had originally hired her, thinking it would be helpful to all of us, but I had unknowingly been saddled with...what? A crazy person? A drug addictd? What?
The dirt and dust that had accumulated around the curls of the hose had not been disturbed. The hose was bone dry. The patio, where the hose typically leaks, was bone dry. The plants were bone dry. The bird bath was bone dry. I thought I was in a Felini film. It was just bizarre.
I wondered if the girl was on drugs or was she insane? Did she IMAGINE that she had watered the plants, when all she had actually done was turn on the water to the hose? I wondered if she thought that the water would magically be transported THROUGH THE AIR to the plants, or was she just piddling around, goofing off and distracted? Did she imagine that there was some kind of underground watering system? I had to question her about her method.
When I asked her why the plants were dry, she said that she just waters the roots - like her mother does. I said, "Okay, but how did you water them? Did you pick up the hose?" She said YES, that she HAD! I asked her which setting she used on the nozzle, and she claimed to use the one that was already there! What the heck????
I was stunned. This girl was resolutely spinning a fantastic yarn, while all visible evidence screamed that she was lying. [This would later turn out to be her typical modus operandi. I would explain a job, set her loose, ask her if it had been done, she would say "yes," but when I checked on it later, it was NOT DONE! Sometimes she had done the OPPOSITE of what she'd been instructed to do. More about that later.]
My stress level ratcheted up considerably. I had hired the daughter of a friend who proceeded to do extremely outlandish things, but I didn't feel I could fire her so soon after engaging her services. The girl had told me several times that her wages were going toward the rent on her family's apartment, and I KNOW that things are "tight" for them because the mother got fired a few months ago, the step-father figure has a career that relies upon projects that come and go. The Covid-19 virus has depressed the economy to the point where these kind of jobs are much less frequent. They were grappling with some serious survival issues. I had originally hired her, thinking it would be helpful to all of us, but I had unknowingly been saddled with...what? A crazy person? A drug addictd? What?
I can't tell you why she didn't water the plants. Perhaps she thought that I wouldn't check on her. Or maybe she just forgot that there was a REASON she had turned the water on at the spigot. She forgot many crucial aspects of jobs that remained half done that she later told me were "details" she could not remember, in a manner that communicated that remembering the "details" of following through with a task may not be worthy of her attention.
I told her many times that, while I appreciate the fact that she is probably too intelligent to do this kind of work, I still, nonetheless, needed her to focus, pay attention, and complete the tasks assigned.
Throughout her time with me, she was incapable of anticipating a need or the obvious steps to finishing any assignment. She would either not finish a project or she would do the opposite of what I had instructed her to do. For instance, when she asked me if I wanted my pants hung up or put in the dryer, I told her to hang them up and showed her how I like it done, but after she had left on her last day with me, I found my pants in the dryer, shrunk beyond recognition and completely ruined. Later, I realized she'd also shrunk a favorite Lands End sweater to the point that the "long" sleeves now ended at my ELBOWS. Obviously, I had to throw away the shrunken clothes.
All she could remember was the first step in any procedure. I asked her to clean the air filter in the air purifier, plug it in next to my chair, and turn it on. She cleaned the filter - and that was "it." She left it sitting on the floor where she'd worked on it. I let it go for a couple days, hoping she would remember to finish this job without my having to tell her - but she didn't- so I explained that she needed to finish the jobs that I give her. Her reply was that she couldn't remember these "details."
Likewise, when I asked her to take the dirty dog bedding out of its crate and replace it with fresh bedding, she put the old bedding in the laundry - and that was the end of it! I gave her time to recognize, on her own, that she needed to finish the job, but eventually I had to tell her myself. AGAIN, she told me that she couldn't remember these "details."
Having to micro-manage this person to the extent that every single step in the process of every single job had to be specifically explained to her was just a nightmare. I learned that I could not just tell her to 'replace the bedding in the service dog's crate.' Even telling her the specifics, such as "take out the old bedding, put it in the laundry, and replace it with new bedding" was more than she could handle. She put the old bedding in the pile of laundry, and she said she was done. So I could not rely upon her to tell me the truth.
Her mother had NOT warned me that her daughter is austistic, which I JUST learned On June 14th - long after the girl had been fired.
What the mother DID say in late April was that communication was sometimes difficult but that she was "dependable as all hell," which I did not find to be true AT ALL. "Dependable" is not how I would characterize it in any sense of that word. I had given the mother ample opportunity to tell me the girl is autistic BEFORE hiring her, when I quizzed her about the girl's strengths and weaknesses.
If this girl is "autistic," it isn't readily apparent, so perhaps she is actually very high on what they call the "spectrum."
Very early on, I had caught her with my pain medication - a bottle of pain killers I used to keep in my purse for when I was caught away from home on some errand when it was time to take my pills. Her excuse was barely even plausible, but since stealing a controlled substance is rather a big deal and I didn't actually catch her consuming them, I didn't feel comfortable firing her on the spot, though my instinct told me I should. If she hadn't been the daughter of a friend I probably would have let her go, but I just couldn't face it - ESPECIALLY since she had told me several times that her salary for this job was going toward the rent on the apartment her family had just moved into.
Many of my friends, hearing the specifics of the incident, told me I was being naïve. I kept thinking about her mother and step-father, my friends, and how they would feel if I fired their daughter after such a short time. I wrestled with it for a couple days, finally deciding that I should lock up my medication and keep an eye on her to make sure she couldn't get near my lock box or the key that would open it.
I continued to try to train her, but she lied about finishing every task, forcing me to hover much more than is physically or psychologically comfortable for me. I asked her to unwrap some new glass containers, wash them and put them in the cupboard. Afterwards, I asked her, "did you wash those glass containers after you unwrapped them?" and she said she had, but after she left on that last fateful day, I found all those glass containers, still in their original commercial wrapping of plastic and cardboard - sitting inside the cupboard. In this case, she had only remembered the last instruction and skipped the first two. Likewise when I asked her to adhere one sheet of contact paper to one shelf inside an empty cupboard, she cut the paper but left it loose inside the cupboard without peeling off the waxed paper so that it would lay flat against the cupboard shelving.
When I told her to wash the dishes, she spent an hour and a half cleaning 3 plates, 2 cups and a collection of cutlery, all of which had been pre-rinsed. She announced that she was finished, and when I walked into the kitchen, I found that she had only done the few items in the left portion of the sink, while the right portion and much of the counter space next to it was full of dirty dishes and the counter, itself, still had coffee on it where it had been spilled.
I asked her why she had not finished the dishes. She said something to me that I find incredible. She said, "Well, I don't know what your kitchen usually looks like." I squinted my eyes and gave her a good look, assessing the expression on her face. I concluded that she didn't have a real answer for my question and that, in defense, her brain had thrown up some absurd reason for her peculiar actions. The poor mad thing was mentally compromised in a profound way, or she was so stoned on my pain pills that she was completely out of it. Who knows?
The only comment her mother had made about her before hiring the young woman was that "communication" was sometimes an issue. "Communication" is one thing, but this collection of behaviors was far more globally outlandish than mere "communication."
I had her look at the big cooking pot in the right side of the sink and told her, "Look at this pot. Do you mean to tell me that you can't see that this pot is dirty?" She looked at me blankly.
"What about all these dishes on the counter?" I asked her. "Can't you see that these are dirty?"
With each piece of cutlery and crockery, I pointed out the dirt, the leftover food, the discolorations, and, in one case, a little bit of mold that had started to grow, as well as the telltale big brown stain of that now-dried sea of coffee that had spilled over some of the dishes, as well as the counter.
She continued to give me the blank look. I pointed out the pots and pans and assorted cutlery in the right side of the sink that she had ignored.
Later, she told me she could not clean the cast iron cookware because she didn't know how to do that. When I suggested she get out her phone and watch a tutorial on YouTube, which is where I learn everything new, she looked at me like I was nuts. She did not look it up on YouTube, and the cast iron pans remained on the stove - dirty and untouched.
When I realized the extent of this girl's limitations, I had to adjust my expectations. I either had to fire her and find someone else, which would hurt the finances of a family that was already struggling during the Covid crisis and also expose me to a stranger whose habits I did not know and may be contageous, or find a way to bring the girl to a point where she could develop a work-around that would enable her to compensate for the functions that her brain was not able to comprehend. On the other hand, if she is a drug addict, which is a possibility, nothing constructive would be possible. I kept wondering how on God's green earth she had ever managed to pass even one college class, much less actually graduate with a degree.
Throughout all of this craziness, I could only speculate as to why my friend wasn't communicating with me and why she hadn't warned me about her daughter's condition. I began to strongly suspect that the girl is somewhere on the autism spectrum, but my friend hadn't had the honesty to TELL me about it when I asked her.
Instead of just giving instructions to my housekeeper and having confidence that it would be done, I had to get up and inspect for myself every single job I tasked the girl to do and, when I found that she was ignorant of how to do the simplest things, I ALSO had to physically show her how things are done, which gave me a rising level of pain and fatigue from the extra physicality involved. The stress began to wear on me more and more.
I ignored the sound of crickets from her mother, my supposed friend, and despite the exhaustion I was feeling from the constant stress of having to micro-manage every moment this person spent in my apartment, I proceeded to try to help this girl meet the "demands" of the job. I reasoned that, if I could help her develop some workarounds to make up for her mental deficits, she could give me some help with things in the house until she went away to college in the fall, and by that time, we should have some idea of whether it was safe to have a stranger working in my apartment, with regard to the virus. I could hire someone who would actually do the job without having to fire my friend's daughter, who would simply move on to her masters degree studies at the next college. At least, that was the plan I had to adopt after I experienced the drawbacks of hiring this person.
On the other hand, if my experience with her was any indication of what the acceptance committee would see with her masters degree application, she would NEVER go off to college again, and I would be stuck with her!
Then, on her last day, an item I had seen her holding one day had inexplicably vanished. It was a thick glass "shade," part of a set of a plate and matching shade that is meant to turn a large Yankee Company candle into something resembling a lamp. Gold flecks embedded in the glass made it sparkle. Every night, when winding down and getting ready for meditation, I would light the candle as the first in a series of preparations. The candle and the matching plate are still here, but, after looking high and low for the shade, I simply can not find it!
I pressed her very hard to tell me the truth. I told her that only she and I were in this apartment since the moment she began working for me, and I am fairly sure the fairies didn't come in through the air vents in the middle of the night and spirit away the Christmas present a cousin gave me. I saw her with it in her hand, fer cryin' out loud, but she claims not to even remember it, but in an odd way that told me she was lying. She said, "I wouldn't usually separate out something like that and put it somewhere else."
After spending the weekend scouring the apartment, looking in all the boxes, in cupboards and EVERYWHERE I could think of, I had to fire this girl. If she had broken the shade and told me about it, there would not have been a problem. No one can guarantee that their work will never result in something being damaged. Accidents happen, and everyone understands this.
I had previously told her this very thing, with regard to a bookshelf she was tasked to put together but had broken. I told her at that time that she shouldn't worry about it and that she was not expected to indemnify her work. All that mattered was that she had told me she had broken it and that she would help fix it. I asked her to find replacement pins for the ones that she had broken. She claimed that she went to the hardware store and that they were not available, but now, after all the lies, I don't know if she told me the truth about that. In any case, the point is that I had already told her that she isn't expected to indemnify her work, and if she broke the item, she could tell me about it. She resolutely refused to admit to what she had done with it. She either broke it and hid the evidence or she took it home with her.
As time went on, I discovered more and more tools and clothes and odd things that are "missing." Some can be replaced, when I have the money. Some cannot. Although that girl is the only person who has entered my apartment since the beginning, her parents do not believe that she took these things. Her mother still refuses to speak with me, and her father called me and claimed definitively that the girl is not a thief and that "someone else" had done something with the missing items, even though I am the only "someone else" that has been in this apartment. The step-father offered to come to my apartment and "help me find" these missing items, even after I told him that I have already looked in every box, drawer, nook and cranny. I am physically disabled, but have NO mental compromises. I didn't hide these items from myself, and I don't know what makes him think that he would be able to find things in my apartment if I myself could not find them.
The step-father suggested that I look in the garage, where the daughter claims she did some "projects." She did NO "projects" in the garage, unless you count taking out the trash and sweeping.
It is one thing to be sympathetic toward someone who has "processing" issues. One can understand that faulty equipment makes functioning difficult. If someone's brain has trouble making sense of incoming information, it is a thing to be pitied, not to arouse anger. But lying and stealing are another matter. Lying and stealing are character issues, and a major betrayal.
The idea that someone to whom I had been very generous and kind would steal from me, lie about it resolutely in the face of absolute evidence, and treat me as if I am some idiot that cannot interpret properly what my eyes actually see should shock and surprise me, but it doesn't, because I have seen this over and over again in my lifetime.
Friends, family, neighbors, strangers, co-workers and acquaintances have stolen from me throughout my life; from my mother who stole my collection of silver dollars when was 11; to the wealthy co-religionist who offered to "help" me when I left the convent by sharing an apartment with me but who actually saddled me with the entire rent while claiming I was only paying half; to the family members who wrote me out of my father's will AFTER he got Alzheimer's and did not realize what he was doing; to the LAST housekeeper I had, a neighbor who also stole from me after I had been extremely generous to her; the world is full of people who think nothing of stealing from the vulnerable who have little protection. The more vulnerable you are, the more vultures circle overhead. Saints are few and far between because most people are operating on primitive, selfish instincts of self-preservation that ignore the underlying spiritual reality that we are all one.
Jesus had to tell people something that should be obvious to folks but isn't. We have to love our neighbors. People outside our natal families, people who do not live with us and to whom we are not related by blood, actually MATTER. We are all "one," a cohesive, connected group of beings, and not just a random collection of nuclear families. Unfortunately, many people have trouble with this "it takes a village" concept. The degree to which a person is selfish and self-centered is the degree to which they are unable to see how they are part of society on a larger scale.
When you steal, cheat or lie to another person, you are hurting the body of Christ and, ultimately, yourself - but not just in the sense that you'll end up going to Hell without repentance. It is much bigger than that. Because of our connection to one another is so deep, when you hurt another person, you are, at the same time and to the same degree, immediately also hurting oneself - and not just impinging on one's future spiritual disposition.
By telling us to love our neighbors, The Lord invites us to take our attention off of ourselves and adopt a wider view - a view that imitates that of God Himself, whose attention and love encompasses all of us.
I DO still wonder why so many people are willing to risk their immortal souls for trivial things that are worth so little, what to speak of friendship. Maybe it is because I am less inclined to steal than most people or because I am not given to much retaliation that makes people feel comfortable stealing from me. Who knows? It is all a mystery to me.
All of this nonsense with the daughter of my friend has come on the heels of another neighbor manipulating me into giving an expensive piece of furniture to her relatives, rather than selling it, as I had needed to do. For several months, this neighbor harangued me, saying I should give away the furniture, rather than sell it, even though it was in brand new, unused condition. I thought she was just giving unsolicited advice. I get a lot of that, as do we all. I didn't dream that she was working me.
Then, early one morning, she surprised me with an uncharacteristic early phone call, out of the blue, and told me that her relative was thrilled to be getting the big queen size bed! She was so overwhelmed by the news, said my neighbor, that she had "cried with joy." I was stunned. I had no idea that this relative of hers needed a bed, and we obviously hadn't discussed giving it to her. My neighbor was talking fast, sounding hyped up and abnormal. I felt ambushed and embarrassed for her at the same time. I asked myself, do I tell her she is crazy and that we'd never discussed such a thing, or do I just let it slide and the let the bed go, giving it to another poor person and hoping the gift would be a good deed?
A flashback of a previous incident hit me - something similar in which this neighbor had need of something and had worked herself into a state in which she had apparently gone to great lengths, mentally, to work out how I would provide this thing, that she just assumed I would be doing it for her - completely bypassing any request for my assistance. Instead, she called me and announced how I would be providing this service. It was very odd, but I knew her to be a bit tense and eccentric and chalked it up to a mental quirk.
Months later, when she called and announced she had arranged for this moving van to get the bed in two hours' time, I was really thrown by it, in spite of my previous experience with this method of hers. I had JUST woke up after a bad night and had not even had my coffee yet. I had to think fast and decide how to handle this, right then and there. I was very aggravated by the scheming way she had done it, but I hated to think that her destitute relative would have to be told that the bed was NOT being given to her after all. Also, it was true that the idea of having strangers coming into my house to purchase the bed made me very uncomfortable, so I went along with the charade and did my best to be as gracious as possible when the relative came to pick up the furniture.
I figured I had done a good deed for her destitute relative, even if I had been squeezed into it, but I distanced myself from that neighbor thereafter, which was easy to do, since she hadn't spoken to me for some time after the bed was transferred to her relative. It was disappointing, because we had been friendly, but the time had come for me to put up some boundaries that would not only protect me from the thieves and manipulators, but also save those people from themselves.
You would think I would have learned my lesson after THAT one - but no, hope springs eternal - at least it DID - until this thing happened with the housekeeper. It was the final straw.
This time - and every time - someone does this to me, I spend a couple days if not outright depressed, a bit down and disappointed. In addition, with my physical medical issues, I am nowadays also exhausted and depleted with constant pain. I can no longer carry the weight of the sinful avaricious nature of other people. It takes too much out of me. It isn't the STUFF that bothers me. It is the betrayal and the spiritual consequences that get me.
Somehow I have to close my doors to the vampires that have been so attracted by my generous nature my whole life. Of course, we have all heard it is hard for an old dog to learn new tricks. Is it possible to become less gullible? I hope so.
God bless you all.
Silver
I told her many times that, while I appreciate the fact that she is probably too intelligent to do this kind of work, I still, nonetheless, needed her to focus, pay attention, and complete the tasks assigned.
Throughout her time with me, she was incapable of anticipating a need or the obvious steps to finishing any assignment. She would either not finish a project or she would do the opposite of what I had instructed her to do. For instance, when she asked me if I wanted my pants hung up or put in the dryer, I told her to hang them up and showed her how I like it done, but after she had left on her last day with me, I found my pants in the dryer, shrunk beyond recognition and completely ruined. Later, I realized she'd also shrunk a favorite Lands End sweater to the point that the "long" sleeves now ended at my ELBOWS. Obviously, I had to throw away the shrunken clothes.
All she could remember was the first step in any procedure. I asked her to clean the air filter in the air purifier, plug it in next to my chair, and turn it on. She cleaned the filter - and that was "it." She left it sitting on the floor where she'd worked on it. I let it go for a couple days, hoping she would remember to finish this job without my having to tell her - but she didn't- so I explained that she needed to finish the jobs that I give her. Her reply was that she couldn't remember these "details."
Likewise, when I asked her to take the dirty dog bedding out of its crate and replace it with fresh bedding, she put the old bedding in the laundry - and that was the end of it! I gave her time to recognize, on her own, that she needed to finish the job, but eventually I had to tell her myself. AGAIN, she told me that she couldn't remember these "details."
Having to micro-manage this person to the extent that every single step in the process of every single job had to be specifically explained to her was just a nightmare. I learned that I could not just tell her to 'replace the bedding in the service dog's crate.' Even telling her the specifics, such as "take out the old bedding, put it in the laundry, and replace it with new bedding" was more than she could handle. She put the old bedding in the pile of laundry, and she said she was done. So I could not rely upon her to tell me the truth.
Her mother had NOT warned me that her daughter is austistic, which I JUST learned On June 14th - long after the girl had been fired.
What the mother DID say in late April was that communication was sometimes difficult but that she was "dependable as all hell," which I did not find to be true AT ALL. "Dependable" is not how I would characterize it in any sense of that word. I had given the mother ample opportunity to tell me the girl is autistic BEFORE hiring her, when I quizzed her about the girl's strengths and weaknesses.
If this girl is "autistic," it isn't readily apparent, so perhaps she is actually very high on what they call the "spectrum."
Very early on, I had caught her with my pain medication - a bottle of pain killers I used to keep in my purse for when I was caught away from home on some errand when it was time to take my pills. Her excuse was barely even plausible, but since stealing a controlled substance is rather a big deal and I didn't actually catch her consuming them, I didn't feel comfortable firing her on the spot, though my instinct told me I should. If she hadn't been the daughter of a friend I probably would have let her go, but I just couldn't face it - ESPECIALLY since she had told me several times that her salary for this job was going toward the rent on the apartment her family had just moved into.
Many of my friends, hearing the specifics of the incident, told me I was being naïve. I kept thinking about her mother and step-father, my friends, and how they would feel if I fired their daughter after such a short time. I wrestled with it for a couple days, finally deciding that I should lock up my medication and keep an eye on her to make sure she couldn't get near my lock box or the key that would open it.
I continued to try to train her, but she lied about finishing every task, forcing me to hover much more than is physically or psychologically comfortable for me. I asked her to unwrap some new glass containers, wash them and put them in the cupboard. Afterwards, I asked her, "did you wash those glass containers after you unwrapped them?" and she said she had, but after she left on that last fateful day, I found all those glass containers, still in their original commercial wrapping of plastic and cardboard - sitting inside the cupboard. In this case, she had only remembered the last instruction and skipped the first two. Likewise when I asked her to adhere one sheet of contact paper to one shelf inside an empty cupboard, she cut the paper but left it loose inside the cupboard without peeling off the waxed paper so that it would lay flat against the cupboard shelving.
When I told her to wash the dishes, she spent an hour and a half cleaning 3 plates, 2 cups and a collection of cutlery, all of which had been pre-rinsed. She announced that she was finished, and when I walked into the kitchen, I found that she had only done the few items in the left portion of the sink, while the right portion and much of the counter space next to it was full of dirty dishes and the counter, itself, still had coffee on it where it had been spilled.
I asked her why she had not finished the dishes. She said something to me that I find incredible. She said, "Well, I don't know what your kitchen usually looks like." I squinted my eyes and gave her a good look, assessing the expression on her face. I concluded that she didn't have a real answer for my question and that, in defense, her brain had thrown up some absurd reason for her peculiar actions. The poor mad thing was mentally compromised in a profound way, or she was so stoned on my pain pills that she was completely out of it. Who knows?
The only comment her mother had made about her before hiring the young woman was that "communication" was sometimes an issue. "Communication" is one thing, but this collection of behaviors was far more globally outlandish than mere "communication."
I had her look at the big cooking pot in the right side of the sink and told her, "Look at this pot. Do you mean to tell me that you can't see that this pot is dirty?" She looked at me blankly.
"What about all these dishes on the counter?" I asked her. "Can't you see that these are dirty?"
With each piece of cutlery and crockery, I pointed out the dirt, the leftover food, the discolorations, and, in one case, a little bit of mold that had started to grow, as well as the telltale big brown stain of that now-dried sea of coffee that had spilled over some of the dishes, as well as the counter.
She continued to give me the blank look. I pointed out the pots and pans and assorted cutlery in the right side of the sink that she had ignored.
Later, she told me she could not clean the cast iron cookware because she didn't know how to do that. When I suggested she get out her phone and watch a tutorial on YouTube, which is where I learn everything new, she looked at me like I was nuts. She did not look it up on YouTube, and the cast iron pans remained on the stove - dirty and untouched.
When I realized the extent of this girl's limitations, I had to adjust my expectations. I either had to fire her and find someone else, which would hurt the finances of a family that was already struggling during the Covid crisis and also expose me to a stranger whose habits I did not know and may be contageous, or find a way to bring the girl to a point where she could develop a work-around that would enable her to compensate for the functions that her brain was not able to comprehend. On the other hand, if she is a drug addict, which is a possibility, nothing constructive would be possible. I kept wondering how on God's green earth she had ever managed to pass even one college class, much less actually graduate with a degree.
Throughout all of this craziness, I could only speculate as to why my friend wasn't communicating with me and why she hadn't warned me about her daughter's condition. I began to strongly suspect that the girl is somewhere on the autism spectrum, but my friend hadn't had the honesty to TELL me about it when I asked her.
Instead of just giving instructions to my housekeeper and having confidence that it would be done, I had to get up and inspect for myself every single job I tasked the girl to do and, when I found that she was ignorant of how to do the simplest things, I ALSO had to physically show her how things are done, which gave me a rising level of pain and fatigue from the extra physicality involved. The stress began to wear on me more and more.
I ignored the sound of crickets from her mother, my supposed friend, and despite the exhaustion I was feeling from the constant stress of having to micro-manage every moment this person spent in my apartment, I proceeded to try to help this girl meet the "demands" of the job. I reasoned that, if I could help her develop some workarounds to make up for her mental deficits, she could give me some help with things in the house until she went away to college in the fall, and by that time, we should have some idea of whether it was safe to have a stranger working in my apartment, with regard to the virus. I could hire someone who would actually do the job without having to fire my friend's daughter, who would simply move on to her masters degree studies at the next college. At least, that was the plan I had to adopt after I experienced the drawbacks of hiring this person.
On the other hand, if my experience with her was any indication of what the acceptance committee would see with her masters degree application, she would NEVER go off to college again, and I would be stuck with her!
Then, on her last day, an item I had seen her holding one day had inexplicably vanished. It was a thick glass "shade," part of a set of a plate and matching shade that is meant to turn a large Yankee Company candle into something resembling a lamp. Gold flecks embedded in the glass made it sparkle. Every night, when winding down and getting ready for meditation, I would light the candle as the first in a series of preparations. The candle and the matching plate are still here, but, after looking high and low for the shade, I simply can not find it!
Yankee Candle and plate (shade missing)
(Lives in the living room.)
I pressed her very hard to tell me the truth. I told her that only she and I were in this apartment since the moment she began working for me, and I am fairly sure the fairies didn't come in through the air vents in the middle of the night and spirit away the Christmas present a cousin gave me. I saw her with it in her hand, fer cryin' out loud, but she claims not to even remember it, but in an odd way that told me she was lying. She said, "I wouldn't usually separate out something like that and put it somewhere else."
After spending the weekend scouring the apartment, looking in all the boxes, in cupboards and EVERYWHERE I could think of, I had to fire this girl. If she had broken the shade and told me about it, there would not have been a problem. No one can guarantee that their work will never result in something being damaged. Accidents happen, and everyone understands this.
I had previously told her this very thing, with regard to a bookshelf she was tasked to put together but had broken. I told her at that time that she shouldn't worry about it and that she was not expected to indemnify her work. All that mattered was that she had told me she had broken it and that she would help fix it. I asked her to find replacement pins for the ones that she had broken. She claimed that she went to the hardware store and that they were not available, but now, after all the lies, I don't know if she told me the truth about that. In any case, the point is that I had already told her that she isn't expected to indemnify her work, and if she broke the item, she could tell me about it. She resolutely refused to admit to what she had done with it. She either broke it and hid the evidence or she took it home with her.
Duplicate Candle, with matching shade and plate
(lives in the kitchen)
As time went on, I discovered more and more tools and clothes and odd things that are "missing." Some can be replaced, when I have the money. Some cannot. Although that girl is the only person who has entered my apartment since the beginning, her parents do not believe that she took these things. Her mother still refuses to speak with me, and her father called me and claimed definitively that the girl is not a thief and that "someone else" had done something with the missing items, even though I am the only "someone else" that has been in this apartment. The step-father offered to come to my apartment and "help me find" these missing items, even after I told him that I have already looked in every box, drawer, nook and cranny. I am physically disabled, but have NO mental compromises. I didn't hide these items from myself, and I don't know what makes him think that he would be able to find things in my apartment if I myself could not find them.
The step-father suggested that I look in the garage, where the daughter claims she did some "projects." She did NO "projects" in the garage, unless you count taking out the trash and sweeping.
It is one thing to be sympathetic toward someone who has "processing" issues. One can understand that faulty equipment makes functioning difficult. If someone's brain has trouble making sense of incoming information, it is a thing to be pitied, not to arouse anger. But lying and stealing are another matter. Lying and stealing are character issues, and a major betrayal.
The idea that someone to whom I had been very generous and kind would steal from me, lie about it resolutely in the face of absolute evidence, and treat me as if I am some idiot that cannot interpret properly what my eyes actually see should shock and surprise me, but it doesn't, because I have seen this over and over again in my lifetime.
Friends, family, neighbors, strangers, co-workers and acquaintances have stolen from me throughout my life; from my mother who stole my collection of silver dollars when was 11; to the wealthy co-religionist who offered to "help" me when I left the convent by sharing an apartment with me but who actually saddled me with the entire rent while claiming I was only paying half; to the family members who wrote me out of my father's will AFTER he got Alzheimer's and did not realize what he was doing; to the LAST housekeeper I had, a neighbor who also stole from me after I had been extremely generous to her; the world is full of people who think nothing of stealing from the vulnerable who have little protection. The more vulnerable you are, the more vultures circle overhead. Saints are few and far between because most people are operating on primitive, selfish instincts of self-preservation that ignore the underlying spiritual reality that we are all one.
Jesus had to tell people something that should be obvious to folks but isn't. We have to love our neighbors. People outside our natal families, people who do not live with us and to whom we are not related by blood, actually MATTER. We are all "one," a cohesive, connected group of beings, and not just a random collection of nuclear families. Unfortunately, many people have trouble with this "it takes a village" concept. The degree to which a person is selfish and self-centered is the degree to which they are unable to see how they are part of society on a larger scale.
When you steal, cheat or lie to another person, you are hurting the body of Christ and, ultimately, yourself - but not just in the sense that you'll end up going to Hell without repentance. It is much bigger than that. Because of our connection to one another is so deep, when you hurt another person, you are, at the same time and to the same degree, immediately also hurting oneself - and not just impinging on one's future spiritual disposition.
By telling us to love our neighbors, The Lord invites us to take our attention off of ourselves and adopt a wider view - a view that imitates that of God Himself, whose attention and love encompasses all of us.
I DO still wonder why so many people are willing to risk their immortal souls for trivial things that are worth so little, what to speak of friendship. Maybe it is because I am less inclined to steal than most people or because I am not given to much retaliation that makes people feel comfortable stealing from me. Who knows? It is all a mystery to me.
All of this nonsense with the daughter of my friend has come on the heels of another neighbor manipulating me into giving an expensive piece of furniture to her relatives, rather than selling it, as I had needed to do. For several months, this neighbor harangued me, saying I should give away the furniture, rather than sell it, even though it was in brand new, unused condition. I thought she was just giving unsolicited advice. I get a lot of that, as do we all. I didn't dream that she was working me.
Then, early one morning, she surprised me with an uncharacteristic early phone call, out of the blue, and told me that her relative was thrilled to be getting the big queen size bed! She was so overwhelmed by the news, said my neighbor, that she had "cried with joy." I was stunned. I had no idea that this relative of hers needed a bed, and we obviously hadn't discussed giving it to her. My neighbor was talking fast, sounding hyped up and abnormal. I felt ambushed and embarrassed for her at the same time. I asked myself, do I tell her she is crazy and that we'd never discussed such a thing, or do I just let it slide and the let the bed go, giving it to another poor person and hoping the gift would be a good deed?
A flashback of a previous incident hit me - something similar in which this neighbor had need of something and had worked herself into a state in which she had apparently gone to great lengths, mentally, to work out how I would provide this thing, that she just assumed I would be doing it for her - completely bypassing any request for my assistance. Instead, she called me and announced how I would be providing this service. It was very odd, but I knew her to be a bit tense and eccentric and chalked it up to a mental quirk.
Months later, when she called and announced she had arranged for this moving van to get the bed in two hours' time, I was really thrown by it, in spite of my previous experience with this method of hers. I had JUST woke up after a bad night and had not even had my coffee yet. I had to think fast and decide how to handle this, right then and there. I was very aggravated by the scheming way she had done it, but I hated to think that her destitute relative would have to be told that the bed was NOT being given to her after all. Also, it was true that the idea of having strangers coming into my house to purchase the bed made me very uncomfortable, so I went along with the charade and did my best to be as gracious as possible when the relative came to pick up the furniture.
I figured I had done a good deed for her destitute relative, even if I had been squeezed into it, but I distanced myself from that neighbor thereafter, which was easy to do, since she hadn't spoken to me for some time after the bed was transferred to her relative. It was disappointing, because we had been friendly, but the time had come for me to put up some boundaries that would not only protect me from the thieves and manipulators, but also save those people from themselves.
You would think I would have learned my lesson after THAT one - but no, hope springs eternal - at least it DID - until this thing happened with the housekeeper. It was the final straw.
This time - and every time - someone does this to me, I spend a couple days if not outright depressed, a bit down and disappointed. In addition, with my physical medical issues, I am nowadays also exhausted and depleted with constant pain. I can no longer carry the weight of the sinful avaricious nature of other people. It takes too much out of me. It isn't the STUFF that bothers me. It is the betrayal and the spiritual consequences that get me.
Somehow I have to close my doors to the vampires that have been so attracted by my generous nature my whole life. Of course, we have all heard it is hard for an old dog to learn new tricks. Is it possible to become less gullible? I hope so.
God bless you all.
Silver
You are like the Lord in so many ways, dear Sister. You bear the stripes that the sinners inflict on the body of Christ. Jesus will protect you and send you someone that is a Christian and practices everyday by not lying, not stealing and serving others. My rosary prayers are yours as well as my labor if God sends me West. I will tithe to you as you are part of the body of Christ and I love you very much.
ReplyDeleteWe are all part of the body of Christ equally, which I believe is the message of the Prodigal Son, by the way, because even the son who violated the trust of his father and hurt him badly was given equal share of his father's love when he repented and returned to him. Let us all pray for those people who walk away from Christ that they may return and be loved by Him again.
ReplyDelete