Looking for feedback
OK, I'm looking for some feedback here.
Mrs Schwartz came over to see the dogs (and me, presumably).
Montgomery poured it on. He acted more lively than I've seen him in weeks. Either he's playing it up for her, or conning me. I haven't decided.
Anyway. Montgomery looked a little better. Given Mrs S's rose colored glasses, she figures he looks spry.
We were planning on going out to dinner. After a few glasses of wine , she said she wanted to stay home for dinner.
About 9:00, she said she had to go home. I invited her to stay the night and wake up early tomorrow. She agreed.
About 30 minutes after that, she starts getting Zachary excited; talking that talk that one does to get your dog hyper.
Zachary proceeds to knock over her glass of wine, shattering it on the new floor, which is not quite completed.
She gets up to get a towel and starts walking on the broken glass. I warn her about the glass and she points out that she has slippers on, so the glass won't cut her.
As she walks away, I see that she has gouged the glass shards into the laminate flooring.
I start making "pissed off" noises as I sweep the floor, which she notices, and asks me what I'm mad about.
I respond with:
"I'd just like to get the whole floor in before we fuck it up. I'd just like to have one day when we can say the fucking floor is installed before we start fucking it up!"
(Hey, I could've sugar coated things. That's what I said.)
OK, maybe, I'm a little on edge about the floor, but c'mon, I've been busting my ass for weeks, and it's almost done. I admit it. I snapped at her. It's been a shitty day at work, and maybe my fuse was a little short.
She starts packing her shit up.
I ask her what she's doing. I apologize for snapping at her and explain how tense things have been at work.
She responds: "I'm only going to piss you off by being here. Why don't you just get a good night's sleep and we'll go out tomorrow night."
I don't argue. She leaves, with the dogs.
She called a while later to tell me that she got the dogs into her apartment. All is well.
Mrs Schwartz came over to see the dogs (and me, presumably).
Montgomery poured it on. He acted more lively than I've seen him in weeks. Either he's playing it up for her, or conning me. I haven't decided.
Anyway. Montgomery looked a little better. Given Mrs S's rose colored glasses, she figures he looks spry.
We were planning on going out to dinner. After a few glasses of wine , she said she wanted to stay home for dinner.
About 9:00, she said she had to go home. I invited her to stay the night and wake up early tomorrow. She agreed.
About 30 minutes after that, she starts getting Zachary excited; talking that talk that one does to get your dog hyper.
Zachary proceeds to knock over her glass of wine, shattering it on the new floor, which is not quite completed.
She gets up to get a towel and starts walking on the broken glass. I warn her about the glass and she points out that she has slippers on, so the glass won't cut her.
As she walks away, I see that she has gouged the glass shards into the laminate flooring.
I start making "pissed off" noises as I sweep the floor, which she notices, and asks me what I'm mad about.
I respond with:
"I'd just like to get the whole floor in before we fuck it up. I'd just like to have one day when we can say the fucking floor is installed before we start fucking it up!"
(Hey, I could've sugar coated things. That's what I said.)
OK, maybe, I'm a little on edge about the floor, but c'mon, I've been busting my ass for weeks, and it's almost done. I admit it. I snapped at her. It's been a shitty day at work, and maybe my fuse was a little short.
She starts packing her shit up.
I ask her what she's doing. I apologize for snapping at her and explain how tense things have been at work.
She responds: "I'm only going to piss you off by being here. Why don't you just get a good night's sleep and we'll go out tomorrow night."
I don't argue. She leaves, with the dogs.
She called a while later to tell me that she got the dogs into her apartment. All is well.
posted by Exador at
11:15 PM
6 Comments:
OK - for those of us who are new here, who's Mrs. Schwartz?
By
Anonymous, at 10:17 PM
She's my on-again, off-again wife. We're seperated, but dating; trying to put our marriage back together.
By
Exador, at 3:41 AM
3:41AM? Were you up all night stressing about this?
By
Plimco, at 5:49 AM
No, I did that post before work. I don't know why it says that time.
After she left, I was pissed at myself, so I drank two more glasses of gin, just before bed.
So I feel like crap this morning.
By
Exador, at 6:05 AM
What kind of feedback do you want? Do you want to know if we think you're overreacting? Or what we make of the whole situation? Or what?
I'm going to assume you want to know what we make of what you've said here.
So, this is what I think. You do a lot of work to make sure that the people around you feel safe and good, just in general. That I know from the little bit I know you. And from what you write about here, it seems like you do a lot of work to protect the people around you. Look at the way you're worried about Montgomery and thinking about his impending death and the way you describe Mrs S as having "rose colored glasses" about the situation. From the way you describe it, it seems like you're doing all of the hard shit when it comes to him.
Now, look at the way you talk about her coming over "to see the dogs (and me, presumably)" and look what you say to her "I'd just like to get the whole floor in before we fuck it up. I'd just like to have one day when we can say the fucking floor is installed before we start fucking it up!"
I mean, clearly, you aren't just pissed about the floor. I think you're pissed because you do all this work--emotional and physical--and she's not careful with you. The way you write about it, it's like you're not even sure if she's still coming around for you or because it's familiar and it feels good.
And I suspect that it pisses you off, both that she's not as careful with you as you are with her, and that you want that from her.
Plus, even though she makes some effort to clean up her mess, she ends up fucking up the floor you've worked so hard on.
It's not hard to see that as emblematic of something much larger about how you feel about your marriage in general.
Do you know what it would take for you to feel sure she was really sorry about what happened between you?
Because, and again, this isn't any of my business and you can delete this whole thing if you want and call me all kinds of names for being presumptuous or whatever--but it seems to me that you need to know that she really truly knows how bad she hurt you and you're just not sure, because you think that, if she really knew how much she hurt you, she couldn't help but be changed by it. And yet, it doesn't seem like you think that she wants to act like anything has changed at all.
It seems like you're deeply suspicious of that. If you have no faith in her apologies, it seems to me that you're in a terrible spot and it breaks my heart for you.
By
Aunt B, at 6:38 AM
What B. said...
I know this is "your side" of the story, but from the details you've given it seems that you feel she is being glib about the things that are most important to you.
I also think, as a co-parent of two dogs, that part of Montgomery's problem is depression from missing his other parent. Depression exacerbates lethargy, even in dogs. I'd bet you may be a wee bit jealous of the fact that the dog responds so well to her.
And man, but how is that floor symbolic of your whole marriage--at least the parts we know about?
You're trying to replace the bad old stuff with the good new stuff. But the things that made that old stuff bad (dogs, carelessness, alcohol) are already marring the attempts at "new".
I think the fact that you care so deeply about the "new" says a lot about you.
By
Kat Coble, at 6:51 AM
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