I’m Sick and Tired of My Friend Always Being Late, So I Taught Him a Lesson

They say patience is a virtue, but even the most virtuous can find their limits tested when it comes to dealing with chronically late friends. For the woman in today’s story, the breaking point arrived after countless times of waiting in frustration, disrupting plans, and causing unnecessary stress. Enough was enough. But she decided to resolve things in a way that divided opinions.

She shared her side of the story.

I (32F) had a catch-up lunch organized with a friend (32M). This friend is always late for everything. Being late is fine, however in this day and age of mobile phones I have strong feelings that one should try to notify a person if they are running significantly late to a date/meeting.

I got to the cafe at 12 pm, which was the arranged time. I sat at a table by myself, surrounded by the hustle and bustle of the busy cafe. At 12.30 pm, my friend had not arrived, I’d received no text, so I simply left and went home. At no point did I try to text or ring him to see where he was/how far away he was.

The thing is, I knew he hadn’t forgotten our lunch date and that he was just being his usual late self. But I was sick of it.

At 12.38, so nearly 40 minutes after our arranged time, I got a message from him saying, “I’m here, where are you?” I replied, “I assumed you weren’t coming, so I went home.” I then refused to drive back to the cafe to have lunch. I know communication works both ways, but am I wrong? My husband thinks I should’ve just rang him, given that I know his tendency to be late.

But people had mixed feelings.

• “Not wrong! Perhaps now he’ll learn to not be so flippant with your time. This kind of behavior is infuriating. A text is not difficult to send.” donkeyinamansuit / Reddit
• “Hold the line. Or, hang out with this person a lot less. They do not respect you.
  If they did, they’d show up. If they have some kind of disability that makes meeting you on time harder, they are still an adult with theoretical self-knowledge and technology exists that can enable them. But they have to decide if it’s worth their effort. And right now it’s apparently not.” unknown / Reddit
• “I fell out with a best friend partly due to her tardiness. She was always late, usually about 30 minutes to one hour. The longest I have waited was 2 hrs one time (dunno why I bothered) I cut her out of my life (there were a few other issues too), life is too short to be putting up with people who don’t respect you or your time.” sleepypandacub / Reddit

• “To be honest, I think if you want to be petty, you could say, ‘You didn’t text me that you were running late, so I didn’t text you that I was leaving’. But since this person is your friend, and you probably care about your relationship, you could let him know that this behavior hurts you, and you are tired of always having to wait around for him to show up.” Runkysaurus / Reddit
• “Me and my best friend are always late to meet each other. Regularly, our texts to each other saying we’ll be late are sent at the exact same time. If you respect someone’s time, you make that clear.” GinjaJaz / Reddit
• “You’ve laid down a boundary now. Keep doing the same until this friend realizes that your time is valuable and that it’s common courtesy to 1) show up on time for plans and 2) let someone know if you’re unavoidably delayed- and this means genuinely unexpected delays, e.g. a flat tire, a medical issue, etc.” Sleepy_felines / Reddit

• “Constantly being late is inconsiderate, and leaving after half an hour of waiting is totally reasonable. In my opinion, you lost the moral high ground when you didn’t send a text to let him know you were leaving.” scarletteapot / Reddit
• “A simple text saying, ’I didn’t hear from you and am leaving now’ or something similar before leaving would have gone a long way. Not everything needs to be a battle of petty revenge.” JynxedDraca / Reddit
• “We don’t even know if this friend was so late for some justifiable reason. I normally send a text after 10 min asking where they are. If they don’t reply, I would also leave after 30 minutes.” BetatronResonance / Reddit

Teaching her chronically late friend a lesson in punctuality proved to be a journey of self-discovery and mutual growth. Through patience, communication, and a bit of creative intervention, she was able to teach the importance of respecting others’ time and the impact of our actions on those around us.