You won’t catch Bluesleepy crying over a broken bowl, but I’d be wailing and gnashing my teeth
With regard to NaNoWriMo, I’ve slayed the dragon, gingah. As you probably read on Saturday, I took it down successfully but I’m going for more. That’s right; I will make a pair of leather Converse low tops from the carcass. Thanks for the idea Tim!
Naturally it takes a village to write a novel and my awesome peeps have taken over Mondays this month to help me reach my goal. It’s Carry Cardiogirl Mondays — CareCarMo, if you will.
And today my super fantabulous buddy Bluesleepy is hosting the party and she is the hostess with the mostess, let me tell you. She’s a killer cook and she has Jeeves and the staff at her disposal here at the Empire. I’m positive her canapés are to die for and the main course and dessert are not to be missed.
Bon appétit!
As you can probably guess, I am not Cardiogirl. No, I am Bluesleepy, who writes over at bluesleepy.wordpress.com. See, CG is on a break from writing her blog to get through NaNoWriMo this month, so she asked a few of us to help her out with posting.
Now you know why I’m here. Anyhow. So the assignment for this post was “the silliest argument you’ve ever had.” Hmmm. I have to think about this for a bit because I’ve been married for eight years now, and almost all of our arguments are silly.
The one with the pillows
I remember one time we got into an argument not long after we were married because I asked my husband to pick the pillows up off the floor and put them back on the couch. He felt I was insinuating that he was lazy, you see. I’m not quite sure how he made the jump from a simple request to a blatant criticism, but there you have it.
The one with the bowls
I know we’ve gotten into arguments because of the way he unloads the dishwasher. Listen, I am hugely grateful that he even attempts to unload the dishwasher and help out around the house, but is it too much to ask that he put a large bowl under a small bowl, instead of perching the large bowl precariously on top of the smaller ones?
It wasn’t long after that argument that I opened the cupboard to have a stack of unbalanced bowls fly out at me, causing my favorite fruit bowl to shatter upon the linoleum.
I was so sad. (Ed. note: Blue I would have been so livid and so pissed. I think I might have banned him from putting the dishes away. Yes, that’s totally cutting off my nose to spite my face, but I would have banned him anyway.)
The one with the stove
Most recently my husband became angry when I chose to scour the stove instead of doing something else in preparation for having house guests. He felt I was using my time badly, and I should have been doing something far more constructive than scouring the stove.
What he doesn’t seem to realize, even after all these years, is scrubbing things and straightening up and cleaning is usually quite therapeutic for me. I have nothing better to do when I’m scrubbing than to let my mind wander, and it’s during those times that I usually solve some problem I’m facing. So for me to be scrubbing instead of doing something else is actually a good thing.
Try telling that to him, however. It’s like talking to a brick wall.
The one where they live happily ever after
As far as resolution goes, we aren’t too big on resolving things, it seems. Generally we argue about whatever stupid thing we’ve decided to be angry about until we’re both raging mad, and then after a while one or the other will apologize, and he’ll enfold me in his big, strong arms (have I mentioned he’s a full foot taller than me?), and we’ll go back to being a loving couple.
One of my friends pointed out to me once, when I was beyond fed up about fighting about all the stupid little things, that it’s actually a good thing that we fight about the little stuff. It means we’re on the same page about the big things.
It’s much easier to let go of resentment caused by his poor organization of the cupboards than that caused by a difference in opinion regarding how many children to have, or how to discipline those kids, or whether to go to church.
So all in all, I’ll take my stupid little fights. Now it just remains for me to learn to keep my own mouth shut more often so those stupid little fights become infrequent little fights.
Hey, it could happen.
CG asked me to do this post, and yours was much better than mine though now that I think about it, my hubs and i “argue” about these things. Apparently when I “use my words” (I hate that phrase) and just ask nicely, then there is nary an argument.
Seriously, no arguing. Unless we’re drunk and those don’t count unless you remember the next day. I do have a vague memory of Jeff betting more than I approved of without asking. We’re talking a 10 dollar bet vs. 25 and I got really irritated and started storming back to our hotel room.
On the scale of taco bell sauces, we’re in the mild packets.
After 2.5 years of marriage, the toilet seat “argument” just happened. All of a sudden, we move to a new place and he stops putting the toilet seat down. Damnedest thing. I start nagging, and his reply, “I get it, I’m sorry. I didn’t know women don’t always look. I’ll try and do better. You get to know I’ll try and do better and shut up about it.” Well played, sir. Well played.
I love the analogy of being mild taco bell sauce! I think Kurt and I would fall into FIRE, unfortunately. The part that’s hard for me to deal with is he not only blows up quickly, but he keeps simmering over a long time. Me, I flare up, and it’s over.
This post was remarkably hard to write, actually. We’d just gotten into yet another stupid fight, and writing something like this when I was pissed beyond belief was rather hard. I’m glad you liked it.
I, too, enjoyed the Taco Bell analogy — stellar Liz! I’m quite certain Mr. C and I are both mild.
I can see why it would be hard. I hope it was a little therapeutic.
I guess I would take the boiling over the simmering, but both? I would tell him he has to pick. I’m sure it would totally be that easy to resolve.
My husband and I both have fathers with awful tempers so we do our best to not do anger. It makes us very uncomfortable when even perfect strangers are angry in public.
Yelling is prohibited in my house unless there’s a very important sports game on. Or for other reasons that have nothing to do with anger… ;)
I hate raised voices, just brings back the trauma of my tantrum throwing father. He yelled at me once for dropping a TV dinner. “Just wasting money, just wasting money!” I’ll never forget that, I was 7. It’s a joke in the family now, but I bawled for a good hour over that $1 fettuccini with chicken.
We do our best to never discuss our disagreements until we can do it in calm and even tones. I tend to take a bit longer and by that time we’ve either: A. forgotten about it or B. don’t care or C. find that elusive middle ground resolution.
If I get so worked up I start to raise my voice, Jeff will just look at me and tell me he won’t listen to anything I have to say until I calm down. “Well, FINE! We can talk about this in a calm, even tone tomorrow then!!” Is normally my brilliant response.
Episodes like that, the spilled TV dinner, are why I am trying not to get so mad at my husband. I grew up in a family where shouting and hollering and yelling and screaming were the norm, and I would hate to perpetuate that in my own family. Since the only person I can control is me, I am trying to prevent myself from getting all bent out of shape and to remain even-keeled. It’s a work in progress, but I am hoping I’m getting better.
I like your brilliant response, and I might just steal that.
@Liz Oy, that sucks about your childhood. Right there with you.
@blue It is hard to break the chain, isn’t it?
lol….great post blue!
I’m not much of an arguer or at least I wasn’t pre-law school. ;) My silliest arguments tend to be the ones that never really happen. I have a hard time discussing my feelings, as a result, it takes alot for me to actually tell F that I’m upset about something. There have been so many times that I’ve been furious with F, argued with him about it (in my head), resolved the argument and forgiven him all without him ever knowing that “argument” took place. It’s messed up but it’s what happens.
Buf I absolutely love the fact that you have arguments, get your feelings out (sorta) and then resolve it all in your own head. I’ve done that before as well. Sometimes that’s the only way I can get close to resolution.
Thinkin’ ’bout the FOO here.
I can sympathize with the one over the pillows. I have jumped to a similar conclusion when asked to do something by my loving wife. And then a big fight over nothing! My bad, I guess.
It’s funny how that stuff can pop up, isn’t it? I had tons o’ those arguments in the first, um, five years or so of my marriage. I’m not divorced thanks to Mr. C’s infinite patience.