So real. I ask the food truck guys “how you doing” rather seriously and they always give me a little more than everyone else. It’s such little effort to care, and try it seems make me stand out from others.
I did the hot air balloon tour over Teotihuacan and it was pretty amazing. I didn’t even have it on the list, but I found a blog post (with a 2022 post date) about Museums in Roma Norte and the hot air balloon post was the next one.
Once upon a time, I did a similar call for names for my cat. After I had some I started randomly saying them at her. Her name is the one she woke from a nap to mrrrr? at. I’m not saying it’s because she chose it, but she really clearly knows her name.
I have maintained very very limited contact with her at my grandmas request. Basically a text for Christmas and her birthday and no acknowledgement of anything she sends me. Luckily we are geographically very distant, so it’s not like either of us is going to just “pop over” for a visit.
I did tell her I appreciated the recent apology. I thought it was a nearly miraculously improvement. It would astound me if she could come up with something concrete to apologize for.
At this point though, we are strangers. I’m not really interested in the time or effort it would require to get reacquainted. I’ll be cordial and polite over text but I’m not taking calls anytime and like I said there’s no way we’re visiting (and I find it super unlikely we’ll find ourselves at the same event)
My mother was emotionally and physically abusive to me growing up. I started putting boundaries in place once I had moved far far away and that was not going well. We got into a fight during a phone call and she hung up on me.
I decided actually I was happier not talking, but I was open to it if she was willing to apologize.
It took her 4 years to try out “I’m sorry you’re so angry.”
Luckily in the intervening time I had some therapy and done a lot of self help and advice column reading and recognized that not-pology for what it was.
More recently (only 12 years after that first attempt [holy shit that long]) she finally apologized for “what I did to hurt you”.
This is 100% my grumpy old lady cat. She also feels this way if I have to adjust how I’m sitting because she came to my lap but didn’t get balanced correctly and is sliding. I’m like friend you are the one who choose to be here. Why are you yelling at me?
I’ve heard of ominous positivity. Like “you will get through this no matter what”