When I moved to Northampton Mass in the summer of 1990, one of the first people I met was Sky Sutton. A product of a commune, she is smart, funny and generally a good person. Unfortunately like all of us, including myself, has flaws. A few weeks ago, my wife hosted a toga party at Mt. Holyoke College. She invited Sky to come with us, and she accepted the invitation.
During the night as I sat around drinking nothing but a soda and some water, Sky and my wife proceeded to drink. Julie was drinking wine and Sky was drinking beer. By two in the morning, they both were visibly intoxicated and having a good time. Then it went terribly wrong. Despite knowing that Julie had to stay to clean up, Sky announced she was ready to go home. Of course Julie was not done cleaning and informed Sky that she was also a little to drunk to drive just yet. Sky asked Junie a friend if he could drive her home, but it was out of his way. She then asked if I would drive her home, but I said no because, as was discussed earlier, I had a warrant and suspended license for non payment of excise tax. It did not sseem like a good idea for me to be driving at 3:00 on a Saturday morning.
As Julie was cleaning and sobering up, Sky announced “I’m Fucked,” and stormed off into the night walking from Southampton to Northampton. A distance of 10 and 1 half miles. She claims she walked the whole way, but that seems impossible considering the time she arrived home and sent a nice email that is the cause for this rant.
In the email, she bitched Julie out for “stranding her.” Nothing was further from the truth. If Sky had waited for 10 minutes before throwing her hissy fit, she would have found that Julie had not only sobered up enough to drive, but was done cleaning. Sky would have been driven home by 4:00, not the 5:00 she claims to have arrived home by walking.
In the email, she accused me of being selfish for not driving her home at her convenience. If I am selfish for not wanting to be arrested for driving illegally, than I am guilty as charged. I felt compelled to send her an email setting the record strait as I saw it. But being slightly irritated, I also found the time was right to tell Sky that I thought she had had some issues to work out.
I do not say things very diplomatically or gently, and the email was not written differently. I knew the email would cause Sky to react in her irrational way, and she did. She informed me that I was no longer welcome in her house. Not a great loss if you have ever seen her dusty pack rat dingy apartment. I expected that, because she reacted the same way to me several years ago. What was irrational and crazy, was that she told Julie that it was unfortunate that I would not let Julie and Sky be friends anymore. Nothing could have been further from the truth, but that is Sky’s way of manipulating people into her way of thinking.
In the end, Sky turned her back on a friend of almost 20 years who was genuinely if not compassionately offering her my opinion on her situation, perhaps not my place to do so, but are you not obligated to tell a friend your concerned? She also ended her friendship with Julie, because she had the nerve to agree with me on several points in my email.
I suppose we could kow tow and get in the good graces of Sky again, but that is not going to happen because she is just to irrational to deal with anymore. It’s no fun listening to someone put down the USA and men over and over again, while she does nothing but sell swag to friends and becomes mean and spiteful if you do not unconditionally do or say what Sky wants.
I wont relay the things she has said about that night, but she forgets that things get back to us, and I can only shake my head in astonishment at her spin of the nights events.
I wish Sky well, and hope she climbs out of the rut she has spent the last 15 years digging for her self, but I fear she won’t.
