AIBU Friends for Dinner is different to a Formal Engagement?

[Throwawaytheatre]

I was trying to explain this to my lodger this morning and she thinks I’m being “daft”

As well as working a full time in a professional role; I am also an elected member of local government and actively involved in a few local charities and community groups. This past week, I’ve left the house before 7 and arrived back after 8 every single night - so that’s the context that I was exhausted when I finished work on Friday.

A few days ago I was invited to a formal dinner in my elected role. I was sat next to the local vicar and commander of the town’s cadet force at the top table. There were speeches, I gave a speech and the whole thing was served by our cadet forces - it was an enjoyable night but long and I had to be “on” all the time paying attention, watching what I said and did and it was exhausting.

My lodger this morning asked how the night was and I explained the above. She went into a bit of a hump and said I was being ungrateful and she’d love to be invited to things like that. She also said “so I suppose you don’t want [friends] coming for dinner tonight? I was looking forward to that!”

I said, no that’s different, they’re our friends from school - if I want to swear, bitch about work or scratch my arse in front of them I can, I don’t have to be “on”.

That’s when she said I was just being daft.

Please tell me you get what I mean?

I totally get you! You were almost working in the first situation.

Your lodger sounds daft.

I absolutely get it. You’re right. Being ‘on’ is exhausting.

She's "daft". I'm struggling to understand her point.

Shrug and ignore

Yes I do.
I have to go to corporate stuff many evening events. I cannot relax and have too many wines as I have to keep up my professional appearance just with more smiles, jokes and laughs. If my MD heard I'd been swearing and scratching my bum there would be words..

She's a bit thick isn't she?! Does she have a professional job, or does she work in the service/retail sectors?

Your lodger is being daft!!! Of course they is a difference between attending an event in your capacity of your elected role and a cosy dinner at home with friends!!!

@ImFreeToDoWhatIWant she works in a shop on the tills

Sorry for not replying sooner, I’ve been travelling around Asda trying to find tiramisu ingredients!

I absolutely get you. I had similar in my own working life & socialising with friends where I can be warts & all, 100% authentic me as apposed to bullshit best behaviour me, was way more enjoyable

You are correct about the pressure of being ‘on’. I get it. I’ve got to a point in my professional life where I just don’t go to those sorts of events anymore, as they are most certainly ‘work’. But your working life sounds very different to that of your lodger, so I think you are being a bit unreasonable to expect her to understand.

If she has never been to a formal dinner it’s bound to sound exciting (I was certainly quite pleased about the first dozen or so I attended). You do sound a little bit ‘full of it’ (I’m not knocking, as I get how exhausting it all is, truly I do). But trying to explain your commitments to someone who is in a different place may come across as somewhat patronising. Maybe don’t go on about it in future to her. Neither of you is wrong really. Just in different places.

Yeah you're right, socialising with friends is totally different from work events where you have to pay attention and be polite. Sounds like she's jealous

Your lodger is just one of those ignorant people who doesn't realise that professional roles can be gruelling, & too thick to understand why you can't treat a formal event as your own personal jolly.

The type that join an organisation & after the first week are bitching that they could do the MD's role, it's easy, all they do is swan about in a company car & sit in meetings ...

It’s no different from a work conference or client dinner: you’re on the whole time and it’s tiring.

I draw the distinction thusly: if you’re dining companions ask how you are, could you say (jokingly or otherwise) that you were awful?

I have a fairly senior job and bump into colleagues or clients so often when I'm out and about that I feel like I have to be 'on' whenever I leave the house. YANBU, it's exhausting.

It sounds like your lodger is feeling a bit sensitive about her own work/social life and projecting on you. Has she been stuck at home watching Love Island eating beans on toast every night while you’ve been out doing what she perceives as ‘glamorous’ events and she’s just feeling a bit sorry for herself?

I used to get this all the time when I travelled a lot for a previous job. I’d be moaning about having to go to Paris or wherever next week, and people would often sarcastically say ‘ooooh poor you’ but they didn’t understand that my trips to Paris involved sitting in meetings all day and then having dinner at a moderately priced restaurant somewhere on the outskirts of the city trying to make polite conversation with clients that I had absolutely nothing in common with!