To think always being late isn’t a quirky personality trait

[CorianderDestroysFamilies]

I’m meeting my friend today and I already know she’ll be late. Normally she’ll message me at the time we’re supposed to be meeting saying she’s just about to leave so I’ll be stood waiting for 15 minutes, one time she messaged saying she would be an hour late I was already at the meeting point with my DC so it was a waste of all our time.
Anyway I’ve just seen another funny meme about how someone will still be in the bath at the time they should be going out and how hilarious it all is. I just think things like this normalise lateness and justify people like it’s some sort of quirky, unavoidable character flaw when it’s actually really rude and makes people like me less likely to want to see you. So AIBU?

The comment above about someone being optimistic has struck a chord.

My sister is very much like this, my mum is worse.

If a journey once took 10 minutes then that is what it will (or should) always take. No matter that it was at 2am so there was no traffic, all the lights were on green and there wasnt a single delay, 10 minutes is all that is allowed even though it may now be rush hour on a Monday morning. "Oh it only takes 10 minutes...." when being reminded to leave. No, it took 10 minutes once by sheer luck, normally it takes 20!! But that does not compute.

They both seem to think that they can do far more with the time available than they actually can. My mother will "just pop a wash on" before she needs to leavein 5 minutes. Now in theory this is just shoving clothes in the washer and switching it on. 2 minutes tops in her head. Except she has to get the stuff out of the basket, sort it which she is super anal about (I have seen her spend minutes deciding whether a beige top goes in with the whites or the colours), load it, put in the detergent etc and switch it on. So can be 10 minutes or more, but she will be utterly baffled as to why it took so long to do what is in her head a couple of minutes job.

My sister will leave herself 10 minutes to get ready when it always takes her half an hour. I know this as I have timed her. "Oh it only takes me 10 minutes...."

I think people who find planning easy really don't get it and assume because they find it easy, it's just lack of effort on behalf of anyone that struggles.

But I don't think anyone has said they find it easy. I said, and others have said, that we put in the effort.

So think yourself lucky you organised, on time people!!

It's not luck, it's planning and organisation!

You look at people who 'seem to sail through daily life' and assume it's easy for them. You don't know that. You don't know what strategies and routines they have in place to ensure that their lives run smoothly. You want to know how they do it, why not ask them?

Definitely not.

I think being 5 or 10 mins late is fine, I'm not exactly always early myself.

However people that leave you waiting for them somewhere for ages really do my head in.

I remember when I was at uni me and my friend went to uni in 2 different cities - we agreed to meet up at another city that was half way between us. I texted her to say I'd arrived (at the agreed time I might add) at the half way city and was waiting for her at the train station. She replied saying that she was just waiting for the bus to get to the train station in her city so would be anywhere up to an hour!

Yanbu. It's a fucking irritating, inconsiderate personality flaw.

I agree, it's consideration for other people and the value of their time. Not luck.

I don't mind a few minutes here and there but when you know you have to allow for SEVERAL hours every time for a friend who lives 2 minutes away because they hang around faffing about with nothing.

It's a personality trait but does not make it acceptable. If you are someone who is clumsy you make an effort to be careful, and perhaps adjust where you put things. If you are someone who has a poor sense of direction you consult maps more often. If you struggle to wake up when needed you have a louder alarm clock or one further from your bed.

So if you are often late you should take steps to stop this.

To clarify, she is late for everything, and it costs her dearly.
She has multiple health issues, as well as mh issues. She farms, and keeps her own hours for the most part. She will get so absorbed in chores that she will forget to cook. She gets distracted really easily, but then gets sort of locked into what she is doing.
She has issues managing money, she isn't frivolous at all, and spends nothing on herself, but hasn't got the foresight to plan for the unexpected things in life.
She is pretty good in the moment, but has no forward management skills, and will always be one of those people reacting to life, rather than planing it.
She is someone who will always have late fees, higher interest rates, poor credit
It's hard, because I feel like shouting at her, why can't you learn from your mistakes?
Then I remember that a) she has serious mh issues, and in part, it plays a role and b) I'm not fucking great at life either! I am hot shit at spotting others mistakes, and give great advice about what to do, but I struggle in other areas.
I may keep a clean house and be on time, and all that, but I still am bossy, chubby, and temperamental, and shit.
And c) She is fucking brilliant in other ways, including being a huge support for my DD who has MH issues of her own. She may not be a good judge of time, but you won't find a kinder, more pure hearted person.

I just remind myself that she is doing it to herself, not to me. I know she doesn't mean to, and she is trying her best.

@EarringsandLipstick yes I resonate with this completely. I have no idea where time goes either and I can't work out how long things take.

I someone at work asks me how long it will take me to do something I have to guess. I don't know how people work this stuff out.

There are a lot of skills that go into being on time. People who naturally have these skills wouldn't perceive all the steps that are needed. They just do them.

When I started trying to work out how to be on time I had to break it all down.

• you need to be able to work out how long it takes to get somewhere and then factor in all the things that might cause you to be late eg traffic, time to park, deicing the car (still always forget that one!!)
• you need to be able to adjust timings and reprioritise your plans on the fly because of real life eg you have planned to wash up, put a wash in and shopping away before leaving, but the cat throws up so now you need to clean that up, so you need to drop one or two of the things you were going to do. I really struggle with this one.
• you need to know how long things take in general. How long does it take you to wash up a small pile, a medium pile a large pile of washing up for example. If you struggle to work this out, this is learning a list of things individually. My DH is v organised so I interrogate him regularly on how he does things. He just says he just "knows" how long something will take. Wow! That's like a magical superpower to me!
• you need to have an awareness of time passing. My husband just knows all the time roughly what time it is and how long we have before the next thing to be done. I have to constantly check my watch. Obsessively. I am often surprised by the time.
• you have to remember to use your strategies. I have a poor working memory. So find that I often forget to use my strategies eg checking my watch, using my to-do list. It takes constant conscious effort. I constantly forget that things needs to be done. So I may just be about to go out the door and realise I have forgotten something important I had to do before leaving the house.

These are a lot of skills! You organised and in time people should give yourselves a pat on the back!

As you can imagine doing all of the above everyday consciously is fucking exhausting. I am often done in by the time I get somewhere! And I can't arrange to do more than one or two things a day. It's too much and too overwhelming. This helps actually as it's easier to be on time for one or two things. The more things going on the more everything falls apart!

When I was late for school or work, it was usually because I didn't actually want to be there or, in the case of some job because public transport was shit and if I'm already going to be bawled out for not being ten minutes early thanks to rail companies, bus operators, idiot car drivers or errant trees near the line, I might as well get a coffee and bacon roll. Although with some, you got less hassle for being off sick than being 60 seconds late, so if it was going that way after a series of 'I know you were in the building and at your desk trying to get your terminal to work, but if the computer occasionally takes fifteen minutes to boot up and log in, you'll just have to come in half an hour early unpaid every day to make sure it's working by the time the phones go live' , I'd call in sick and spend the day in peace and quiet instead.

As a kid:
Home = shouting, dirt, violence, mess, constant noise, no privacy, no ability to just think and be peaceful.
School = shouting, mess, crowds, violence, no privacy, no ability to just think and be peaceful.
Being late = time to sit in the park in the spring sunshine, listening to birdsong, watching squirrels, flowers and tree blossom.

It is rude. I had a friend who was always very, very late and was used to adjusting timings so that we stood a chance of being on time if we ever needed to go anywhere together as I HATE being late - I am irritatingly early for everything and spend a lot of time waiting around. That was bad enough, but she was, however, very late to my wedding reception (the ceremony was tiny - just family and my one close friend) and was also giving a lift to another good friend of mine. I ended up delaying and rearranging the speeches and the food for them and things were held up by an hour or so. Didn't spoil the day but definitely made me anxious and irritated.

I am always late. I hate it and I honestly try hard to be on time, but no matter how early I start getting ready I just dont seem to be able to actually get places on time.

Its really not because I value my time more than other peoples - as even when it's purely my own time I mess it up. I've had restaurants cancel me, I've missed flights, trains etc costing me loads. I've I've stranded after last trains. I look a mess every day as I get ready and no matter how early I get up, I'm always rushing out the door and have to run instead of walk. Its embarrassing. I'll wear ripped tights as I've not left myself enough time to take them off and put new ones on.

I'm aware of how stupid this sounds, I'm highly qualified and have a professional job but I'm just absolutely shit at timekeeping.

Why bother to make an effort when she clearly doesn't? Being late is inconsiderate and selfish. If she realises that you've been waiting around for her that makes it even worse. Why waste your time with this nonsense?

You are being taken for granted. What do you think her reaction would be if you were to do this to her? Frankly, I'd not waste my time. In fact I'd feel like making arrangements to see her, not turn up at all and see how she likes it - not at all, I'm guessing.

It's not quirky.

It's rude and downright selfish.

If you know your time management is so poor that you're always late then you either do something about it like setting your clocks early, or accept you're going to lose friends over it. Because someone turning up 15 minutes or half an hour late with a "oh, silly old me, what am I like, i'm so flaky and always late hahahaha" attitude is really just saying "you are not important enough to be on time for".

Cannot abide lateness.

Put at its harshest, it says that - deep down - they think their time is more important than yours

Utter bollocks. I’ve seen this before and it’s so ridiculous. There are all sorts of reasons people can be late and not all of them are within the person's control.

99% of the time, if I’m late it is down to something happening with DD that is outwith my control. People who care, understand that and don’t give me a hard time about it.

I can’t see why people get so worked up about it. If you know your friend is habitually late, then don’t turn up bang on time. If you end up making them wait, they probably wouldn’t have a problem with that. If we need my mum somewhere by a certain time, we tell her to be there 20 minutes earlier than we need. Nobody is left waiting, and she doesn’t arrive all stressed out.

Like the previous poster, I have dyscalculia, and have huge problems with time. I've got better with age, because I've learned more effective strategies to deal with, so I'm generally on time for most things these days, but it's taken 20 years of effort to get to that stage, and and I still have to put in a lot of effort on an everyday basis.

Do they have a job?

Yes, but it pays just above living wage although I have a postgraduate degree.

Do they ever go to appointments?
Yes. Sometimes I miss them. If it's unmissable, I spend hours planning how to do it. If it's a regular journey (to school, to work etc) I can get a routine that works, and that point, I'm usually fine. One-off events are a lot more hit and miss.

Do they have children?
Yes. You don't need to be able to tell the time to be a parent. My kids perceive time the normal way.

Do they ever cook?
Yes. I'm a very good cook. I don't use time cues, but things like colour and texture and smell to know when the food is ready. I bought a rice cooker with a keep warm function recently, which was a life-changer.

I avoid making appointments where possible, and often socialize by inviting friends over for a meal etc, where I don't have to be on time, because that way everyone is happy. I pass as being normal but a bit ditzy so most people don't know how much effort I have to put in to normal things like being on time or doing a timed task, or checking finances, or writing down numbers, or working out what order to do things in.

My sil is like this, think I've mentioned before when she was due at our house mid afternoon, and she finally shows up at 9pm. She has a baby now & ita just exasperated the issue as now she says she can't get the baby ready on her own, so has to wait for her shift working partner to wake up to help her. Meanwhile I'll get myself & 3 kids ready.

I'm someone who is always early. Even when i was juggling toddlers & newborns together I'd ensure i always overestimated times for everything. So for example an activity that takes me 5 minutes to drive to, I'll leave 20+ early as it takes time to get all kidd strapped in & find parking etc.

My DH is either really early, or running late. No inbetween. If its early its because he's decided to get ready early and can't stand waiting around for a time to leave. If hes late its because hes decided to "take a quick shower" and turns the shower on but gets distracted by his phone & so forgets to actually get IN the shower.

But lets be honest here, its really not that hard to work out when to leave to get somewhere on time is it? If you're always late, leave earlier! Its not rocket science. I hate it when I'm on time and the other person messages to say "just leaving now" WTF!

I have a friend who is usually late - maybe 15-30 mins and always very apologetic, but still. It used to annoy me massively, but now we have a new system. I continue to be on time, but for every 15 minutes she is late, she has to buy my round (we mainly meet after work for drinks). So if she's 30 minutes late, she is on the hook for four rounds, two of hers and also two of mine. It does help me that she is paying for it (literally and figuratively), and I'm no longer annoyed and grumpy when she rocks up 30 minutes late. And we can also laugh about it in a light-hearted way when she once again heads to the bar. But she is rarely more than 15 mins late now!

I’d rather be an hour early for something than 5 minutes late.

I abhor lateness, it’s so fucking rude.

Put at its harshest, it says that - deep down - they think their time is more important than yours

100% this...

it's simply FUCKING RUDE

@Musti I'm the same as you. I'm in no way lazy or selfish. But I find if I have time to spare I'll start doing something , ie a chore , before I leave then I think oh crap I'm going to be late! I also feel very anxious whilst getting ready as I try my best to get to places on time but with 2 DC more often than not something unexpected happens which makes me late. I do try my best to give myself loads of time to get sorted & be on time but I too often underestimate how long things take ie. finding car parking spaces, allowing for traffic, walking from car park to meet up point with DC. Before DC came along I was often late but it's just due to not giving myself enough time to get ready , not that I lay in bed for half the morning I'm always up early, but I have a problem with leaving the house unless everything is pristine & spotless & I often do things that could wait till later... it's not always as cut and dry as people not giving a shit.

Someone on here recommended this link a while ago and as a habitually late person I found it pretty eye opening about my own reasoning. I am still working on improving but it's helped me recognise when I'm doing 'just one more thing' for example, and I need to stop and go out of the door.

gretchenrubin.com/2014/05/are-you-chronically-late-8-tips-for-showing-up-on-time

Why do you even bother entertaining her

Lateness is just selfishness.

I used to be late often, but have made big efforts to improve. I actually prefer to be early for a meeting as this gives me time to sort things out and prevent being flustered. I find it difficult to estimate how long a task will take and often underestimate the time to carry out a task. Still a work in progress.