Here's the thing. I'm never going to tell you a story about how I fought with someone and how it was all their fault and how I was completely blameless. The truth is I have a big mouth. Even if I hadn't started the fight, I want to finish it. And even when I don't want to finish it, I've certainly said something to continue it.
I guess last Saturday I wanted to fight.
First I got up early and decided to go Christmas shopping. I kissed Hubby good-bye at 9 AM while he was still in bed. He asked when I would be home and I told him that I would be home for lunch. I went on my merry way and knocked out some serious Christmas shopping. Just after 1 PM, I headed back to my car and started to head home. At 1:23 PM, I noticed that I missed a call from Hubby at 1:14 PM. I thought, "Oh, he must be getting hungry. I'll call him real quick and let him know that I'm on my way home." When he answered, I could hear a lot of noise in the background. When I asked where he was, he told me that he went out for lunch because he was tired of waiting for me. Tired of waiting for me? It took me nine minutes to call him back. Well, I was pretty pissed and I ended up hanging up on him (I'm also not the most mature fighter).
My issue with that was that he didn't call me at 1:14 to see where I was. He called me to tell me he was going out to lunch even though I told him I'd be home for it. He doesn't think about how I'm not telepathic and didn't know that he'd been hungry for an hour beforehand. I thought it was rather selfish that he called and then ran out the door.
I sat around waiting for him for a couple of hours while he ran errands. I confronted him when he came home. And, no, this is not the part of the story that is referring to when I really screwed up. I stand by my reaction to him doing that. He tried to blame it on a "miscommunication". No, I communicated accurately that I would be home for lunch. He chose to ignore that and went to lunch when he got hungry.
This was a little thing. We talked about it and it went away (sort of).
We picked out a Christmas tree that evening but Hubby wasn't in the mood to decorate it. So we put it up and plopped ourselves down on the couch. After a couple of hours, we decided to go out to dinner.
We went to a restaurant that had a special strawberry rum drink on their menu. I ordered one. Please note: I do not drink that often, so my tolerance is low.
I started drinking and it was delicious. I offered Hubby a sip and he was stunned by how strong it was. Immediate issue: I hadn't noticed. I sucked down my drink and was definitely feeling it when we left.
In the car ride home, I started harping on him about how he buys my Christmas gifts a year late. I guess you'll need a little back story for this. Here it goes:
When I first moved to Houston in the fall of 2008, we were not going to have a TV in the bedroom. This would be the first time since I was about five that I didn't have a TV in my bedroom. I had made comments about it when I originally moved, but I got over it pretty fast. We lived in a little apartment and now that I had someone to go to bed with, it really didn't seem necessary. For Christmas 2009, I really wanted a DSLR camera. Like, really badly. Hubby had asked what I wanted for Christmas and this is a direct quote of how I responded, "I really want a camera. Please don't get me anything other than a camera. All I want is a camera. It's going to be expensive so please don't get me anything other than a camera." That Christmas there was a box, about the size of a camera under the tree. I was excited for days leading up to it so that I could open my camera. When I opened it, it was a TV remote. He had bought me a TV for Christmas. Well, I was certainly surprised....
Last year, I had asked Hubby to get me a really nice standing jewelry box. I wanted the kind that was like a piece of furniture. But, after talking about how much money we had spent already for the season, we decided that that was going to be too expensive. So he didn't get one for me. Although, I have to say, once he started spending, he definitely spent that kind of money on me. Anyway, I received a gift from my mother a few days ago. She does everything early. It was a jewelry box. When I called her to thank her, she said 'A little birdie told me that you wanted that.' I laughed because that was last year.
I know. I know. I sound super materialistic with this sidebar, but please realize that I'm not a stereotypical woman. I do not drop hints at what I want and then act disappointed when I don't get what I want. He always says that it's so hard to buy me presents--FYI that's ridiculous. Spend five minutes in a mall and anyone that has ever met me can spend about $100 that quickly. I'm super easy to buy for. So to help him out, I tell him what I want. He doesn't get it and then he complains about how hard I am to shop for. I couldn't imagine how he would have handled being with one of those women that just hint at things and expect their husband to be a mind reader.
End of sidebar.
So back to last Saturday. We were in the car on our way home. I was drunk from one drink. I started harping on Hubby about how my presents are always a year late. He says something like "See why I get stressed out about what to get you." Then I start yelling that it's not hard to get me presents because I tell him what to get me, but he makes it impossible.
Then I want yogurt so I make him stop. But he doesn't want yogurt so he pouts about it. I don't want to sit with him pouting so I yell in the parking lot to get back in the car. And then this is where I really blew it (trust me, I was not at my finest in the moments leading up to this but it gets worse).
I start yelling at him in the car that I'm sick of not telling him things because it will damage his sensitive ego. I screamed about all the things that bother me that I never talk about. I yelled about his Christmas decorations, I yelled about issues in the bedroom, I yelled about assorted little things that I had been keeping to myself for a reason. Individually, hearing each one probably wouldn't have been so bad. But hearing all of them at once. I don't know if there's a word strong enough to describe how mean I was, and Bitch certainly isn't going to cut it.
We got home and Hubby remained calm. He parked himself in front of the TV and I lost it again. I was screaming for him to get out of my face (in my defense--the little that I can make for this case--I wanted him to leave the room not the house). I continued yelling until he left.
Pretty much as soon as I heard the door close behind him, I thought, "What just happened?"
I waited a little while and then I got in my car and went to the pool hall he usually goes to. He wasn't there. I called him. I said "I'm sorry." He said that he went for a drive. I waited, not patiently, for him to get home. I apologized again when he got home. I really felt terrible. I don't often apologize, sometimes even when I know I'm wrong. But this was worse than just wrong.
Things weren't right with us for a few days. We were speaking but it wasn't right. I felt awful every day until it was. He's not easy to make a nice gesture for to fix everything. He's not a big eater so I couldn't make him a dinner to come home to. I thought about maybe making spicing it up in the bedroom but even that I knew couldn't fix anything. As upset as he was, it was very likely I would have been rejected and I just couldn't handle that.
On a lighter note, he did come around Tuesday night after we watched New Girl. Zooey Deschanel is his major celebrity crush. I finally heard him start to laugh while we watched the episode, and then when it was over, he asked, "Do we still have that Conan she was on last week?" So we watched that. After that much Zooey, he was over it. He was back to his normal self, chewing my ear off as we got ready for bed and as we laid in bed trying to go to sleep. So now I know. When having a major fight with Hubby, always have a Zooey show/movie on hand. I think I'm going to run out and buy (500) Days of Summer.
