The Devil in Mr. Rogers

Since yesterday was pay day, it was also pay-the-bills day. That means that there was a fight at my house. (And yes, thank you, the swelling is going down nicely. I should regain full sight in my eye by the end of the weekend.)

I’ve written before about my wife’s style of argument, also known as Blitzkrieg. To sum up, my approach to disagreement resembles Mr. Rogers, only a much gentler, milder and more reasonable Mr. Rogers.

My wife, however, prefers the conversational stylings of the master vampire from Blade: Trinity. Only she’s not so calm.

So I will definitely have to rant about our argument to decompress. That, and a gallon of coffee, will get me back on my feet. But I also need to be fair to my wife. As I’ve written before, she is a great woman, and I love her very much.

In order to be fair and balanced, I’ll give you a list of my own faults now, and then in another post, I’ll write about the argument. I know you’ll all disagree with my list. “No, no,” you’ll think, “that can’t be true. Lefty is the model of perfection.” But it is true. I am not perfect.

Without further ado, here are ten of my faults (in no particular order):

1. I am as insensitive as a stone. I am not aware of, nor do I anticipate, other people’s feelings very well.
2. I am regular in and uncompromising about my personal routine. It drives some people in this house nuts.
3. I sometimes snap quickly and say things in anger. Fortunately, my anger rarely lasts for long.
4. I can be very, very lazy.
5. I am much more sexually needy than my wife, and sometimes push her too hard.
6. I enjoy argument for the sake of argument and will persist even if I am sensing that the other person is not enjoying the argument so much.
7. I nitpick constantly. I do this with myself and others. It made my ex-wife batty. My wife hates it even more. I’m working on it.
8. When I believe I am right, I can become extremely unyielding and self-righteous.
9. I try too hard to be funny. It covers up my fear that people won’t like me.
10. I put off doing some things that are important.

Yes, it’s true that I am not perfect, but the sun will come out tomorrow.