Do I have to answer her e-mails?

That dreadful woman! How dare she inconvenience you by being forced to leave her home!

Of course you don’t have to respond.

But I’m also seeing it from her POV- She’s in huge financial trouble but still went out of her way to do you a big favor because you don’t want to bother to learn to drive, and now you’re upset because she stopped doing you the favor?

Were you contributing financially to the upkeep of her car, giving her gas money, or doing anything to make this a cooperative agreement rather than her just being nice to you for nothing?

You can always ignore emails. But you work with this woman and she has shown herself to be somewhat unstable. You could be in for real trouble if you snub her.

I understand your frustration, @baileysmom12, but I think given her situation 2 days notice was just fine. She was nice enough to give you a ride for nearly two years, so out of civility I would answer her emails.

@pdworkin She knew about it a month before but didn’t tell me till the last minute. Guess I should have said that too.
@Likeradar Yes, I was giving her gas money. Even when I was out of town on conferences for a week, I always gave her the full amount. I’m upset ONLY because she waited until the very last minute to tell me. And it’s not like I don’t WANT to drive, I CAN’T drive due to panic attacks when other cars are on the road. I tried for years to overcome it but it didn’t work.

I suggest you stop biting your tongue! TELL her how you feel (via email if you don’t feel comfortable talking to her in person or on the phone), hear her side of it, and even if you don’t like her explanation, you will have done the right thing for yourself.

For two years she inconviences herself, to give you the benefit of a ride to work, when you are unable to do this for yourself (no shame in that you couldnt, i understand panic attacks well) and then when she reaches hard times (her own doing or not, is not the issue here) you would think it ok to stop talking with her, and be angry at her??

Maybe it is frustration at yourself, that you are able to do this seemly normal everyday task for yourself, and that you are taking out your frustration at her over this. I certainly cant see how she owes you any more than what she has done for you, even if she had given you just one days notice. Im sure she has much more important things on her mind at this time.

As a friend i would think you would be thankful for the assistance she has given you for two years, and as a friend i would think you would be more understanding of her situation….

Maybe you could answer her e-mail because for two years she accommodated you and your phobia to getting your own drivers license. Maybe she is phobic about paying bills. From here you sound just a wee bit like an ingrate or fairweather friendly.

it doesn’t matter how long her notice was, if i had to leave my home this would definatly be something I would not be thinking of… 2 years to help you get to work is a pretty wonderful favour to make… and she wants to keep in touch…. what is stopping you?
You found some one else to give you a ride to work… so it does not matter anymore…and never did.

@Mclaren7703 Great point. She’s getting evicted and is behind on her bills- telling you that your ride to work is ending was probably far, far, from the first thing on her mind.

It’s great that you paid her gas, but you getting to work is not her problem. What did you do if she was sick? If she took vacation? If her car broke down?

did you ever consider taking a tram….train…a bus?

@Mclaren7703 You could be right about me being angry with myself. But it was benificial for her as well. There were a lot of times that the gas money I gave her was all the gas money she had and I lived on her way to the bus stop so she didn’t have to drive out of her way to pick me up. We took the bus into work. I would give her extra gas money sometimes when she was really low on cash, (mostly due to buying books and TV series and movies from Amazon every week) which was quite often.

I think the others may have a valid point about putting themselves in another’s shoes, but they have not put themselves in @baileysmom12‘s shoes either. More notice is not too much to ask. How mad you want to be and how you handle it is up to you, but you are not obligated to answer her emails.

@bean We did take the bus. It’s about 7 miles from my house to the bus stop. Too far to walk. It’s even longer to the train stop.

maybe buy a bicycle and ride to the bus stop or train stop :D or even a motorized scooter!
you should have a back up plan… other wise if you can’t get to work, no one will take you on short notice…

@Snarp Sure, @baileysmom12 has every right to be thinking “aw crap, I wish I had more notice!” But going so far as to shun the person who gave her a ride every day for 2 years and then fell on very hard times is kinda selfish, imho.

Also, @baileysmom12 Why did you take a job you can’t get to?

Sometimes people who don’t live in a place where public transportation is not an effective option or have access to other transportation alternatives don’t understand the very real hardship that not having a ride can be.

@Snarp Thank you. That is the point. I saw her every day and she never told me about it. Had she told me sooner I wouldn’t have had so much stress about finding another ride. I would have had a month to ask around. I spent this whole week-end in a knot worring about how I was going to get to work today. My mom gave me a ride to the bus stop but she is 72 years old and doesn’t need to be driiving in the dark, but if I got fired for not showing up then me my mom and my daughter would be out of a house. We’ve lived ther for 8 years and I really kinda like the place.

If you consider yourself this person’s friend, then yes, you are indeed obligated to answer her emails. That’s what friends do.

If you’re not her friend, if the ridesharing just made you acquaintances of convenience, then of course you need not answer her email. But I’m assuming you’re still working at the same place together. And as coworkers, you might have some problems on the job if she considers you to be her friend and feels jilted.

Regardless, no point in complaining about how she spends the money you give her. You know her well enough at this point that you shouldn’t be surprised. And unless she’s under contractual obligation with you to provide transportation services for a specified period of time in exchange for that money, you really have no claim.

I can see that waiting until the last minute is very irritating, but she probably wasn’t thinking of you during this rough time in her life. She probably just assumed that you’d find another way and take public transport until you straightened the situation out. Maybe she waited so long because she was embarrassed about her troubles.

If you’re so upset that you’re finding it hard to work with her and speak to her, then you should probably say something to her civilly. Send her an email response saying something like, “I know you’re going through a hard time and I wish you well, but I’m a little upset about only being given 2 days notice that I wouldn’t have a ride to work anymore. Please give me some time to get over it.” Ignoring her completely isn’t helping anything, especially if you wish to remain friends with her.

@Likeradar When I first moved in where I live now, we had a bus line that stopped right in front of my house. It’s outside the metro area and it got down to just two riders and the discontinued it. The only thing I am upset about is the fact that she didn’t give me more notice. She is acting like it’s no big deal and even joking about it. There is a very long story about her and her financial troubles too.

Gets the world’s largest spider and yes it is alive :D

She is acting like it’s no big deal and even joking about it because she’s embarrassed by the whole thing.

And oft times, people are evicted with almost no notice (well, except all the bills, of course). Two days notice might be all she had to give you.

Gosh, let it go.

Never wanted to be her friend in the first place? Fine. Delete those emails and ignore her.

You were her friend but now feel snubbed? Get over it. She’s obviously in need of a real friend. Step up and be one.

I know for me, I would have been angry about being given such a short notice. I have anxiety issues too so I know how that can feel. I would have been angry at myself for having to rely on others, for not being able to be ‘normal’ and for yet again- being in a crappy situation (and embarrassing) because of my panic attacks. So I would probably be more angry with her to deflect some of those feelings of inadequacy about myself.

Be careful to put the anger where it belongs. Don’t give her too much anger to hold, especially if what you’re really mad about is the whole situation and not just her small part in it.

I would cool off, journal about it and talk about how I felt. Then I would talk to her in emails and let her know it upset me- but I completely understand how things can get away from you very quickly. She supported you and now you are in a position to be supportive to her.

It all worked out in the end too- since you found a new ride and he only lives a mile away.

Somehow I think there’s more going on here than just a ride, one way or the other.

overall…it was a wonderful thing she did for you…
If you consider yourself friends with this person, then email them!
If you do not wish to be her friend or you don’t consider her as a friend of yours then don’t email her.
doesn’t matter what went on between you and her… friends stay in contact, and she seems to be like some one who needs a friend at the moment. Even if that just means sending emails and talking to eachother.

@Snarp Nope just a ride to work is all.
@gemiwing Thanks. I can always count on my friends at Fluther to set me straight when I step out of line. I guess I am angry at myself more than anything else. But she did know a month ahead of time that they were having to move. I just wish she had given me more notice. Like I said I ALWAYS gave her gas money and a lot of times I gave her extra gas money. It’s not like they didn’t have the money to pay rent, they just didn’t. She works, her daughter works and her son-in-law works. Plus the daughter and son-in-law are even getting food stamps because they didn’t report that they were working. They just didn’t think they had to pay rent.

@baileysmom12 What I mean is that this whole story about her financial issues, whatever else you know about her, has colored your perception and how angry the loss of the ride made you.

@Snarp you are right of course. There have been several things in the past that has made me want to go off on her but because we were (are) friends, I held my tongue. I guess this has just been the last straw

I think you should tell her you are frustrated with her. Although I understand both sides. Sounds like she has a lot of troubles also but still e mailing you is nice of her if she is not being rude. You don’t have to, but if I was you I would at least tell her how you feel.

@dutchbrossis Thank you. Like I said she is sort of joking about it. Emabrrassment has nothing to do with it either. She is very quick to tell everyone around here her (self induced) problems. She is always getting mad at people when they don’t communicate with her but she couldn’t tell me ahead of time that I needed to start looking for a new ride???? Not too many people here at work like her to begin with. They are always coming up to me telling me that she is the rudest thing they have ever met. I tell them that she isn’t rude she just has to get to know someone before she talks to them. But she is rude to people. When her husband died last year I sponsored a bake sale to raise money for her. I raised over $300.00, she never even said thank you. I was one of the few people around here that did talk to her, I was doing that BEFORE I started riding with her. It was her idea for us to ride together to begin with. I am very grateful for the rides she did give me, I just don’t like being told at the VERY last minute that I need to find something else.

Not returning her emails is just being cowardly and avoiding responsibility IMHO.

If you don’t want to continue to be friends with her is a separate issue. The very least you can do is to be assertive and responsible and tell her why. At least if you tell her straightforwardly why you are ticked off at her, it gives her the opportunity to learn from her mistake and/or apologize to you.

Perhaps you want to avoid that because then you would feel churlish in refusing her apology? Whatever your feelins are, take responsibility for them and deal with her in a straightforward manner. Your silence tell her nothing. If you wish to drop all connections to her then al least have the guts to say so to her.

It’s pretty clear that you have little respect for her choices in life. But the only pertinent part of that is the one area (transportation) which impacted you life negatively. Deal with that part of it and leave the rest of it alone unless she asks you for advice about it. You can’t change her or run her life more efficiently. All you can do is express to her your feelings about how it affected you and either accept her apology or move on. Not answering her emails just needlessly drags the whole thing out. Deal with it already. Then either forgive her or don’t and move on.

@Buttonstc I am answering her e-mails. I am not ignoring her at all. I am just upset at the short notice and her joking about it. I was just wanting to know if I should be mad or not. I guess I don’t really have the right to be mad.

:) what you just said is spot on, no need to be mad at all, and its ok if you get upset at her joking around….sometimes i feel it’s a bit forward and awkward when people do that.
just be nice and polite to her :) your doing the right thing now.

@bean Thank you. :):)

I just wanted to add that where I live there’s a service called metroaccess. It’s a blue van that picks you up at your home and takes you to the metro stop. This service is for handicapped people. You might want to look into it and see if your public transit offers anything like this.

—@Haleth we have that here, it’s called access a ride. it is only for handicapped persons and i do not fit that catagory. i just never learned to drive. several of the people i work with do use that service though.—

@baileysmom12 If your anxiety is truly so bad that you absolutely cannot learn to drive a car, I bet you can find a way to convince the powers that be that it’s a handicap and that you can utilize Access-a-Ride.

Wow looks like I stumbled into a hornets nest here. I think you have every right to be mad that she gave you no more notice than that. I’d be mad too. Sounds like you did a lot for her too. You raised $300 for her? That’s awesome. You gave her extra money, I don’t know if I would have done that or not. You sound like you were good to her too. I really don’t understand all the attitude you got for this.