Love, actually

I've been pretty nice to H (husband) lately on these pages.  But, today he made me really cross - so mad that I was actually thinking the "D" word... Sigh...
    This isn't uncommon.  That's the whole point.  Constant forgiving and tiny efforts at generosity of spirit and memory are at the center of a relationship.
I made H mad too - of course.  Here are the embarrassingly  mundane details:
     --He comes upstairs after his shower, and as usual he puts his deodorant on in the upstairs ("my") bathroom .
     --I tell him not to turn on the water because I just cut my hair and I'm going to vacuum the hair out of the sink and off the floor.
     --H tells me that when he cuts his beard he puts a newspaper in the sink, and I should too.
Well, I know that he puts a newspaper in the sink, and I also know that I always have to finish cleaning up after him... So, it galls me a bit that he lectures me.  Yes, I know it wasn't a lecture, just a "helpful comment," and I try hard NOT to say what I'm thinking.  That is, I really don't want to scold, nag, or be pettty.  Instead I choose to react with a smile and a small insiders joke - let's see - a song we heard recently in some movie... Something about my haircuts being special...
    Doesn't work: H won't let me off the hook without responding to his suggestion... so I do make the above two points: [one] I know he uses newspaper, and I always clean up after him anyway and [two] since I'm going to do the cleaning, does it matter whether I use the newspaper. (No question mark, because, to me, it's clear that this is a rhetorical question.)
     Humberto get's mad.  He claims that it's about minimizing the hair and that HE is the one to unclog my drain.  The latter isn't true - the drains in the upstairs bathroom have never become clogged - but H does periodically do the thankless task of pulling up the stopper in the bathtub downstairs to get out the gross gunk which starts to slow that drain.
     I won't pretend to remember all of the dialogue here - and I won't pretend that I was a saint, but I can swear that I was working hard NOT to get excited or worked up.
     H was steamed, though, because I wasn't recognizing that from now on I would definitely use the newspaper over the sink like he does.... And truth is, I could have said that, and it probably wouldn't have been so incredibly difficult to say it or do it.
      But H overreacts and I get stubborn.
     Behold! The central image I have from this argument; it was about this point that the D word crept into my imagination:  H comes out of our closet in his underwear, he's holding his socks in his hand, and he SLAMS them down on the bed and loudly says, "Damn, damn, damn, Fu..., damn..."  He goes on to say that I "always discard his things." By this he means that "siempre descarto sus sugerencias."[descartar: verb - to throw out, can be used to imply something thrown out without any thought or consideration[.
     Actually, later that day, and even days later  (this post being written over several days - btw)  I giggle when I think of the sock-slam.  You see, if you're frustrated, slamming socks down is just not a very effective gesture.  The only thing worse is to do a sock-slam while wearing only tighty-whities...

     I try to make H understand that he chooses whether or not to let these little issues make him mad.  He can't help it - he gets mad.  Am I evil because I refuse to placate him right away?  That is, I can't predict that he will be infuriated by my reaction to any one comment, but it would be pretty easy to just practice the, "Yes, I'll do that."
     But, I can't.  It isn't me.  Sometimes it's a matter of not agreeing with him - others it is  just stubbornness.. or maybe I'm going to think about it - look it up, whatever. But should I say I'll do it - and then ignore him if I decide that I don't agree?  Maybe I could be much more tactful.  Still, that's a recipe for disaster too - because then the next time he sees me doing "it" wrong (whatever "it" is), he'll really explode.  So, I try to stay honest, unless it's some very particular comment about something I'll probably never do again... or something like that.
     He's so convinced that I "descartar" his ideas that he over-reacts.  Probably ten minutes after the explosion had ended, but when we were both still irritated, I explained it to him well and mollified him.  I pointed out that for four decades I'd always put a lot of the hair clippings from my haircuts into the toilet to flush.  I'd only changed that behavior because I had listened to what he said to me a few months ago; he'd seen me do that and told me not to because it could clog the toilet.  Now, that objection did seem possible to me, and so I changed my method.
    "See, H., I do listen to you and I do change my behavior based on things that you say."  I think he might have hugged me there and I let myself be hugged for a few second and then hugged him too.... I'm guessing about this scene because I took too long to finish writing this - but it is something we would do.
     A few thoughts to wrap up .
     One: I hope that nobody thinks I believe I am without guilt.  Heck, I don't even think I'm capable of describing this situation without bias.  But, I do often wish I could record these interactions - except I couldn't know they were being recorded.  See - it's impossible.
     Two: What do I mean about "thinking" about the D word?  Hmmm.... As H is yelling or behaving in a way that I find unreasonable, I'm wondering - "would I"  "could I"  "what would it be like"  It doesn't usually last long; it's been  a really long time since there has been some sort of situation which even made me take that idea to bed at night.  Instead, nowadays, I just  let it go.  It's easy to get back to equilibrium - back to seeing us as a "yunta" - back to recognizing . . .  (STOP! This is getting too far away from the idea I wanted to build in this post)
     Three:  You know who I've observed who is very good at agreeing with H and acting as though she believes H is right?  His ex-wife.  (Because their daughter V lives with us, naturally my husband's ex-wife has stayed with us more than once and, as much as H would rather avoid a lot of interaction, they have talked about things a number of times over the past decade.  It was only during her last stay, however, that I observed a conversation or two and suddenly it clicked... She was really good at saying he was right or acting like she thought it.  But, you can be damn well sure that  - let's see... How to put this?  Oh, Hell, this is like quicksand; even though I wasn't planning on saying anything insulting about his ex, it would probably end up sounding mean-spirited in a way I didn't intend.  So, let's leave it at this.