Do Me a Favor?

The Guardian (UK) website has a weekly feature that allows readers to respond to relationship questions. Some recent examples:

My boyfriend won’t tell his kids about me.

Would it be fair to retire and let my wife carry on working?

My husband has been having an affair with his ex-wife for the past five years.

Here is last week’s topic in full:

My boyfriend and I are in our mid-20s. We’re in full-time employment and live separately. We each earn a modest amount, with him about a grade higher than me. We have very different views on money. I’m frugal, he’s somewhat frivolous. He often borrows money from me at the end of the month. I have obliged in the past and he returned it as soon as payday came around. I have recently moved out from my parents’ house and so my outgoings have increased a lot. I have savings, but these are strictly for a house deposit. I told him that moving out would mean that I wouldn’t be able to lend him money any more, but he asked again. I refused, and this escalated into an argument, with him accusing me of not helping when I can, and that doing this out of principle has hurt him. We can’t agree, and I’m not sure how to move forward.*

The reader responses were very thoughtful, often drawing upon personal past experiences:

“I once went out with a man with a similar attitude to money.”

       “I was married to someone who (eventually) didn’t seem to care how much he spent on drink  when I was working and keeping both of us.”

“I had an ex who was not as responsible with money as I was . . .”

The readers agreed that at the very least the writer should not back down from her stand about no more loans. 

Many readers went further and warned about the future, if the writer were to continue the relationship with someone the readers saw as having character issues. As one wise reader remarked:

Disagreements over money probably break up more relationships than infidelity. . . . You’re allowed to break up over matters of money. It can be miserable being in a relationship with someone who is careless over money and expects you to bail them out.

The response that most matched my own? “Tell him to get lost.”

*

Some years ago, when I was playing tennis regularly, two friends and I would purchase a season’s court time at a local indoor club for Thursdays from 7:30 to 9 PM. We were assigned court number 1. We would rotate play—2 weeks on and 1 week off. 

On the first Thursday of a new fall season, my friend (Frank or Vic) and I were approached by Brad, the club’s teaching pro, who had a favor to ask. He had invited some friends to the club to play doubles, but the only court available was court 7, which, owing to a lack of space, had been put down as a singles court without the doubles alleys. Would we trade our court number 1 for the singles court, so that Brad & co. could play doubles? We graciously obliged.

The following Thursday Vic or Frank and I were down on court 1 preparing to start play, when through the curtains there came Brad & co. all set for action. 

I put my hand up. Not this week.

*

I once had a colleague who volunteered to drive me home. “But you live in the complete opposite direction,” I told him. “It would be an inconvenience for you.”

“If it wasn’t an inconvenience,” he replied, “I wouldn’t be doing a favor.”

*

I don’t know if it should be labeled an adage, a maxim, or an aphorism, but one of my favorite dicta is:

Once is a favor. Twice is an obligation.

Never put someone to an inconvenience twice. And never allow yourself to be inconvenienced a second time—for there will be a third and a fourth time. Better for them to think you a stinker than to have your life controlled by leeches.

***

*https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/aug/02/should-i-lend-money-to-my-financially-frivolous-boyfriend#comments