The Monday Rant: Inconsiderate Non-Schedulers

Today's rant is a full-fledged personal rant.  I usually try not to get too personal with these, but today is the exception.  I won't be naming names, but the hours I spent fuming over this issue will not be in vain, for lo, I can rant on my blog.

We have a college group that meets on Sundays after church.  We have met on Sundays after church since our inception in January of 2008.  For a while we met on Sunday evenings instead of right after church, but we have always met on Sunday.  While I was in college, I only missed once or twice because of illness (plus the whole semester when I was literally 1,000 miles away), despite being scheduled to work on Sundays.  I made it happen, because a small group is important.

Since I married the group leader in September of 2011, I have been rather in charge of cooking lunch for the group.  Since we meet right after church, we always have a nice meal together before diving into whatever we're studying.  And since we moved just down the road from the church, we've invited the group to meet at our house.  It's more comfortable, we have real plates, and it's just a nicer small group setting.

Well, starting a few months prior to our move, people started just not showing up regularly.  We finally discussed it and it was made clear that every week was too much commitment.  They had other places to be, other people to see on Sundays, but if we met only every other week, they could definitely do it.  So we decided to meet every first and third Sunday.  That's easy enough to remember and very easy to schedule.  Since we decided that, we've had 4 first or third Sundays that aren't major holidays or church-wide luncheons.

Of those 4, one person came twice, and another came once.  That's right, we've had 3 weeks of 3-person lunches where 2 of the people were Caleb and I, and 1 week of just us.  That is not a small group.  That's hardly a dinner party.

(They managed to come just fine to the church-wide luncheons.)

So why am I pissed off?  Oh, you couldn't tell?

Let's see what happens.

"Oh, certainly. I can definitely do 1st and 3rd Sundays; that makes it so much easier to schedule!"
"Oh, you say next week is a 3rd Sunday?  I can definitely be there!  I'm planning on it."
"Yes!  I'll definitely see you next Sunday for group!"

So many people definitely planning on it.  I break my back (figuratively) cleaning the house and cooking a nice meal and then only one person shows up.  (And I am very grateful to those one persons for helping cut back on our leftovers!  That one week, we ate mac & cheese for, well, a week!)

In fact, this week, it meant cleaning the house the night before, then getting up at 6:00 to go to church early with Caleb (he has to be there at 7:00), sitting around until the first service starts at 9:00, then leaving immediately afterwards (meaning I don't get to see my family who comes to 2nd service, whom I have not seen all week and am desperately missing), to go home and cook for a group of people who did not show up.

There are lots of adjectives I could use to describe this behavior and here are a few of them: rude, obnoxious, annoying, irresponsible, and inconsiderate.

I understand that being in college, one can't always schedule out their week perfectly.  And I'm not asking for 2 weeks' notice, or even 1 week's notice.  I would like to know by Saturday evening at 8:00.  Do I need to get up early, miss seeing my family, and cook and clean for you?  If you are going to show up, I will do it gladly. I enjoy having company over and I love to cook for people.  Seriously, I'm like a giddy schoolgirl when we have company!  But if you're not going to show up, just tell me, for Pete's sake!  Surely you can know that by Saturday evening!

Love and Day-Timers,
Leah Joy