2001:November:5
2001
OK. The fight. For some freakish reason, Mark and I seem to always have our BIG FIGHTS (and truly these are the only kind we have - no day to day bickering or little fights) on Sundays. They are ALWAYS triggered by a misunderstanding over something small. I'm rather biased on this, but it also seems like we've had a role reversal that Mark is unaware of: whereas in the beguine, I was the crazy LET'S HASH THIS OUT TONIGHT!!! AND NEVER GO TO BED MAD person always going at the REASONS we blow such a small thing out of proportion. But lately, it seems to be Mark (unconsciously) egging me on and trying to take on the role I used to play. For instance, the previous big fight didn't become a big fight because I just never bit - I never FREAKED OUT. I remained calm and said "you love me. I love you. I don't know what this is about, but it doesn't matter in the long run blah blah blah". Last night, I freaked out.
Firstly, Mark argues like my father. He's one of those people who (and funnily enough I suspect that he learned this from his father) will talk to you and respond to what you are saying in the beginning of a fight. He communicates tit for tat, but he really isn't saying anything but regurgitating what he said ten sentences ago. He systematically is looking for the trigger. He'll get a little heated and say things that he KNOWS are touchpoints of mine (like last night I got called "I thought you were this arbiter of truth" "god I can't believe how insecure you are" ). At this point, I'm trying to understand what this is really about. I'm hurt and confused a little, but I haven't lost it. THEN, it turns out that I reach a limit where I feel like "DO I HAVE TO SAY THIS AGAIN. I'M GOING TO SAY THE SAME THING I JUST SAID. OK, FOR THE SEVENTH TIME: I THOUGHT THAT YOU HEARD ME AND AGREED WHEN I SAID I WANTED TO WATCH FARSCAPE AFTER YOU TALK TO ERIC, AND SO I GOT MY FEELINGS HURT WHEN YOU WERE GOING TO GO TO TRIVIA NIGHT WITHOUT ME...THAT IS ALL. WHAT IS THE BIG DEAL???? WHY ARE YOU STILL ON THIS????" Finally, he will nail me on some minor point that I feel is relevant but not BIG PICTURE material. He will then proceed to DRIVE HOME this minor point (last night's was "you didn't IMMEDIATELY ask why the hell I was going to trivia night when I just said that I was watching Farscape with you. You waited and then said some snide remark. This means you are insecure in our relationship, and I HATE THAT.") while I will say "*&$#(*#@&$(@#*&$ &(@#^$(@#*^$(@*# &$ IF YOU F-ING SAY THAT ONE MORE TIME, I'M GOING TO GO INSANE. I AGREE, BUT LET'S MOVE ON!!!! WHAT DID YOU MEAN WHEN YOU SAID THAT YOU DON'T KNOW HOW LONG YOU'LL BE ABLE TO STAND THIS? ARE YOU DOING CONDITIONAL LOVE ON ME? GOOD GOD!!! YOU *%#!@" He will reiterate the hated thing he said, and yes this is where I lose it usually. Sometimes I even say, "Why don't you put me out of my misery and divorce me then and live your life as a carefree bachelor - because you'll NEVER find a non-freak woman who is not emotional. This is crazy bitch-freak is WHO I AM, and you know what? I don't like the way you act like a cold robot, but I don't say - if you keep acting like that I don't know how long I can stand it. What the fuck?".
And bam! The shutdown occurs. The ole switcheroo. I have bit the bait. I become so pissed off that I am SCREAMING (yes, psycho neighbor style) at the top of my lungs how frustrated he makes me. He commences to watch tv and ignore me completely. I start talking in speech-size increments the size of the Gettysburg Address. Nothing. I talk and talk about how I feel and how confused I am. Nothing. He will answer direct questions, but that is all. THIS DRIVES ME CRAZY. It drives me crazy that I have let myself become this freak banshee over some nothing and that this problem that originated with a misunderstanding has become world war three and that I have allowed it to and in the process fallen for the bait WHEN I KNOW. I KNOW that it gets me nowhere. It's the equivalent of how pissed I would be if I got hooked on cocaine. I'm livid. I'm the tasmanian devil (and I never like looney toons cartoons - especially that character). And Mark is ice. He's rational. He's calm. He doesn't have anything to say. The only thing he'll deign to say at this point is big cold things like "I can't talk to you when you're like this...." To me, I just read it as "if you don't change, I may not love you". This starts me off again. Oh, and I'm pissed the WHOLE time because my precious Sunday is slipping down the drain. So, eventually, we fall asleep and I don't even touch his toe with my toe. By the morning we're cuddling like usual and he'll say something like "do you still hate me," and I'll say "do you still hate me" and voila! We're back to sane lovers again, and I am soooooo relieved. I mention how those fight people are really us, and that it's OK. He's talking to me. He loves me. I love him. We both know that the fight is a symptom of life frustration, and we say that we have to stay together for the schabies, and it's over. Until next time.
The bad part is that I suspect Mark thinks these fights are doom doom doom for our relationship. I see them as symptoms of lifestyle stress getting to us. I mean, usually, we're 100% carefree. We don't feeb about bills, jobs, the future, anything. I feel that because we are like that that our worries will come up in a big, unexpected way and then they're over. I mean they almost always happen when Mark is low on money/jobs or some other unsettled thing is in our life (god the fights we had in NYC before we got settled and Mark got the film feed).
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