why I don't like to share
It's true. I don't like to share. Almost anything, almost ever.
When I was growing up, my mom was a stay-at-home mom and my dad was a factory dad. We didn't have much money, but we did have a lot of toys and books and crayons etc., because we hoarded everything we were ever given. It had to last. If you destroyed it, or allowed it to be destroyed--say by leaving it out in the rain--it was just gone. Even if it just wore out through love, it would probably not be replaced.
There was one exception, but I won't go into that. Even having a well-loved broken thing replaced had it's down side; the replacement toy took the place of what could have been a new toy at Xmas. And we still kept and played with the broken toy, incorporated its new broken state into the game world where it had always lived, and which it thereafter shared with its replacement. Maybe on some level we felt that broken things couldn't be replaced, even if you purchased another, I dunno. In today's language, that's just how we rolled.
But. A lot of my friends and cousins had mothers who worked, and my mother was often pressed into service as a babysitter, or sometimes, after school tutor. So other people's kids would be at our house a lot, sometimes. We--my brother and I--were expected to be good kids, be nice, play nice, share our things. So we did.
Other people's kids treat our stuff like crap. For one thing, it wasn't theirs. For another thing, even if they broke their own crap, their mothers would replace it, and maybe they didn't get that these things that they lost or ruined were gone, or at least forever changed, well...forever.
Did the mothers replace our crap that their kids destroyed? No. Maybe because my mom was (and is) one of those people who would rather die than stir up conflict, and she probably never even mentioned the destruction wrought on the residents of our elaborate let's pretend worlds.
Anyway, that's why I don't like to share. And I fight the selfishness, but honestly, I don't feel like I should have to. Over and over again this early lesson has been reinforced; no one takes care of my things like I do. I get markers back with the tips mooshed up, discs come back scratched and with the covers creased, my car comes back with no gas and the radio buttons reprogrammed (really, who does that in a borrowed car?!) and my computer comes back with fingerprints all over the screen and stuff installed I didn't want installed...and this does not include things that are borrowed and never come back at all, or that I have to ask for repeatedly (really, I have to beg for my own cat carrier dvd money things back?!).
Then the borrowers are puzzled why this upsets me, and I just get angrier, because to me it seems obvious.
So before you ask, the answer is no. You can't borrow it. Yes I know I'm selfish. I don't care. Because to me, it's even more selfish to pressure someone else into doing something they don't want to do because what you want is more important than what they want. As of today, I'm all done explaining, because there is no way of saying no to these requests that doesn't seem to offend the other party, which makes it a lose-lose situation for me, and I don't know anyone who enjoys being on the receiving end of those.
When I was growing up, my mom was a stay-at-home mom and my dad was a factory dad. We didn't have much money, but we did have a lot of toys and books and crayons etc., because we hoarded everything we were ever given. It had to last. If you destroyed it, or allowed it to be destroyed--say by leaving it out in the rain--it was just gone. Even if it just wore out through love, it would probably not be replaced.
There was one exception, but I won't go into that. Even having a well-loved broken thing replaced had it's down side; the replacement toy took the place of what could have been a new toy at Xmas. And we still kept and played with the broken toy, incorporated its new broken state into the game world where it had always lived, and which it thereafter shared with its replacement. Maybe on some level we felt that broken things couldn't be replaced, even if you purchased another, I dunno. In today's language, that's just how we rolled.
But. A lot of my friends and cousins had mothers who worked, and my mother was often pressed into service as a babysitter, or sometimes, after school tutor. So other people's kids would be at our house a lot, sometimes. We--my brother and I--were expected to be good kids, be nice, play nice, share our things. So we did.
Other people's kids treat our stuff like crap. For one thing, it wasn't theirs. For another thing, even if they broke their own crap, their mothers would replace it, and maybe they didn't get that these things that they lost or ruined were gone, or at least forever changed, well...forever.
Did the mothers replace our crap that their kids destroyed? No. Maybe because my mom was (and is) one of those people who would rather die than stir up conflict, and she probably never even mentioned the destruction wrought on the residents of our elaborate let's pretend worlds.
Anyway, that's why I don't like to share. And I fight the selfishness, but honestly, I don't feel like I should have to. Over and over again this early lesson has been reinforced; no one takes care of my things like I do. I get markers back with the tips mooshed up, discs come back scratched and with the covers creased, my car comes back with no gas and the radio buttons reprogrammed (really, who does that in a borrowed car?!) and my computer comes back with fingerprints all over the screen and stuff installed I didn't want installed...and this does not include things that are borrowed and never come back at all, or that I have to ask for repeatedly (really, I have to beg for my own cat carrier dvd money things back?!).
Then the borrowers are puzzled why this upsets me, and I just get angrier, because to me it seems obvious.
So before you ask, the answer is no. You can't borrow it. Yes I know I'm selfish. I don't care. Because to me, it's even more selfish to pressure someone else into doing something they don't want to do because what you want is more important than what they want. As of today, I'm all done explaining, because there is no way of saying no to these requests that doesn't seem to offend the other party, which makes it a lose-lose situation for me, and I don't know anyone who enjoys being on the receiving end of those.