MY News to Share

The recently divorced religious woman from my neighborhood, who has backed off for the moment of us being BFFs, has not ceased her crusade to spread the word around the neighborhood and in fact the country, despite my asking her to cease and desist.

Because she has always overcompensated for her lack of self-esteem and self-awareness, I have not had a particular desire to hang out with her, not in the 12 years that we have lived down the street from each other. Now that she is free of an apparently horrible relationship, and pregnant, she feels that it is duty somehow to point out that life is great, life is fantastic, and the stress in her life is the best thing that ever happened to her. That's her glossing over her feelings, as she works as a "Life Coach" and must be perpetually chirpy and bossy.

Now that she is due to give birth a week before me and we are both in the same situation of single parenthood, she also feels it is her duty to tell anyone and everyone that I am pregnant, which I resent. Not that my being pregnant is a state secret, but it is my news to tell, and quite frankly, I am getting tired of hearing from people, some of them virtual strangers, who say, "I heard your good news from Ms. ---." Even my family asks me if they can speak about the impending main event.

Perhaps she is hoping that the perceived power of the scandal of my baby's conception will provide enough fodder for the rumor mill, overshadowing the fact that she is an abrasive woman with a failed marriage. For a supposedly emotionally evolved Life Coach, she is doing a lousy job of listening and respecting my privacy.