“Mommy, can I wear my pretty Christmas dress tomorrow even though Christmas is over?”

Yes, you may.

(Fast forward to tomorrow.)

“Mommy, can I wear the pretty dress? You said I could.”

Yes, Lexi, you can. (Big smiles.)

“Mommy, where’s the black jacket that goes with this dress?”

It’s in the hamper. You wore it yesterday, and it’s dirty.

(And the tears come. Then the whine. Then the ripping off of the dress. Then the running away from me as she screams…)

“But, mommy, you told me I could wear the dress! And now I can’t because it’s dirty!”

You can still wear the dress. Quit being so high maintenance.

(Crying, crying, and more crying with daddy going to comfort her.)

You see? I don’t really care what she wears. Scratch that. Yes, sometimes I do care in that I don’t really want her to wear pajamas on picture day or wear a dirty uniform to school. But on a normal day, I really don’t care. I don’t even care what I wear half the time. I don’t care about whether I am wearing accessories, if my shoes match, or whether my purse is brown and I’m wearing all black. I really don’t care about clothes. I dislike shopping with a passion and am more than mildy irritated when conversations with other women focus solely on clothes, make-up, and jewelry.

I like everything to be low maintenance. I once asked a friend for a low-maintenance flower or plant. She suggested a flower and told me that I would just need to water it once a day. No deal. Anything that requires tending to on a daily basis equates to high maintenance for me. I received flowers at work one day. They were in a box, and I thought they were lovely. My coworker was slightly appalled that I was planning on leaving the flowers in the box versus taking them out and putting them in a vase. I knew that entailed taking them to the kitchen, snipping off the ends and adding water and flower food. Then repeat every few days. Ummm…no thanks. She ended up doing it for me.

I crave low maintenance relationships, too. I like befriending people who don’t have major issues. It tends to reduce the drama in the relationship, which is a plus to me. Okay, even as I write it and read it out loud, it sounds…selfish on my part. In my role at work, I tell people all the time that relationships are hard, but that if it’s a long-term relationship they care about, then they need to be willing to invest the time and effort into it because the benefits are worth it.

I don’t heed my own advice. If I were posting an ad for a friend, it would read something like this:

Friend Wanted. Not needed because I’m self-reliant and don’t need a friend to complete me. That’s called co-dependent. Looking for individual with few or relatively low key personal and professional issues. I do enough counseling at work and am not looking to counsel people in my personal life, too. I’m looking for a friend who won’t mind if I don’t call regularly because I don’t really think to do so, but I want this friend to be available to go to dinner or out for coffee whenever I want to. Oh, and this person needs to be able to do so at a moment’s notice because I’m intentional and OCD about planning for everything else, but I’m not so great at planning time with friends. If you play Farmville on Facebook, please don’t apply because I’m judgmental and am not sure if I want to be friends with someone who plays Farmville.

Relationships by nature are reciprocal. If you find yourself to be the best company, that might make you a hermit. And when I think of a hermit, I think of Ted Kaczynski, otherwise known as the Unabomber, and well…we all know what he did, and I don’t want to be like him. I think it’s possible to have a life full of low maintenance relationships, but then I’d have to be okay with having a life full of superficial relationships.
People aren’t plants. Isn’t that profound? If I don’t nurture and maintain the flowers, they die. I can live with that. I enjoyed them while they lasted for a brief moment in time. If I’m not willing to nurture and maintain relationships with people I care about, the trust and love they have for me will die. The question is whether I can live with that.

So my New Year’s resolution is to be more selfless when it comes to relationships. My need to only have relationships that meet my standards and expectations makes me… (BIG GULP here)…high maintenance.