Cancelation Friend

Everyone is flaky these days. Counting on people to be there when you need them is hard. Respecting that people are busy, and having things that uncontrollably come up, plans get canceled. Rather it’s your car is broken down, came down with the flu, or just in a funk and don’t want to go out tonight, cancelation happens. That is not cancellation friend.

Cancellation friend cancels more than you actually ever meet up. If you see them five times a year, and had plans with them twenty times, all in which they cancelled. You have yourself a cancellation friend. She is always down to make the plans, but keeping the plans is a challenge. Cancellation friend comes in different levels. Each with their annoyances and you need to decide how much last minute change you can consistently have in your life.

Level one – She is unorganized and will always forget. You will text or call and confirm plans (eventually feeling like you are her secretary) only to have her deeply regret, she made other plans. Now this cancellation friend could be a friend that is trying to give a hint that she doesn’t want to pursue the friendship any longer. You will soon know because most likely she will later text and reschedule (we are friends) or you never (she’s moving on) get a text again.

Level two – This cancellation friend doesn’t commit, she says things like, “sounds good.”. When you follow up on the said plans, once again being the secretary, she explains she wasn’t sure we made plans. She is more of a non-committal friend, but in the end is still always cancelling just the same.

Level three – This is the purest form of cancellation friend. She makes plans, and cancels on you moments before. She tells you to meet her at the park for a run, texts you and says maybe tomorrow while you’re standing there in the cold at 5 a.m.

Years ago, I had a cancellation couple that my husband and I were friends with. They would come over for dinner, make future plans with us, and subsequently cancel. It could have just been lunch the next day, or even a vacation that we just booked the hotel for. It was a pattern. There were always so many excuses on why they cancelled.

Most of the time it was a sob story, so if you complained about the cancellation, you looked like a jerk. These types of friends will always ask for, “a raincheck.” This means I need to invite them out again, just to have them cancel. People like this get exhilarated from making plans. Having something to look forward to is exciting for them, even if in reality they know it is essentially impossible to follow through.

Cancellation friend sometimes doesn’t want to let you down, so they say yes, hoping to make it work out in the end. Unfortunately, when it doesn’t you are frequently left holding the bag, or reservations.

Some level three offenders are so in love with the idea of making plans that they cannot even have a conversation about anything else. I used to have a cancelation friend that would only text me about making plans. No conversation. Right off the bat they would start in, “Hey I miss you! Let’s get together.” We would have a conversation via text, only about the plans. Then the night before, or morning of they would cancel. A few days, or weeks would go by, and I would get another text, “Hey I miss you! Let’s get together.” I started referring to these texts to my husband as, ground hog day texts. It was the same thing over and over. At one point we didn’t see each other for six months, but had at least planned a dozen different activities. All in which she would plan with me, and then cancel the day of or before.

It eventually became a running joke around, “Wow its 7pm, she hasn’t cancelled yet!” We would be shocked, only to laugh in the morning when there is a text at 7am, “Sorry can’t make it”. When better (in her mind) plans came up, she would take them. One day I had to tell myself, I am worth more than that and the time I was regularly carving out of my schedule for her could be better used on a friendship that was actually encouraging and would have long-lasting staying power.

The moment you tell someone no, that you cannot make plans just to have them be cancelled, again, you are the bad guy. You will be called mean, and they will say you don’t respect they are busy. Never do level three offenders see that they are not respecting you by the unfailing and endless cancellations.