Tuesday, June 16, 2015

Pet Peeves Revealed

Everyone has pet peeves. Some people shares those peeves out loud while others silently take the offense. I am the former. If you do something that bothers me, I will most likely say so. Sometimes I might take a few breathes so my anger doesn't show, other times . . . well, I'm sorry.

My husband is the latter. Well, I can't say that for certain. I don't know if he actually takes offense or not. You see, he has never actually told me of any of his pet peeves, nor has he ever pointed out anything that I do that bothers him. (And you all know I am not the perfect wife!) Could it be that nothing actually bothers him? That is what I was led to believe for these past six years . . . but I was corrected two weeks ago when we had a friend over.

Our friend was talking about a pet peeve he has with his wife. And Chris said, “Yeah, Emily does the exact same thing! I don't get it!” What? That bothers you?! I had absolutely no idea.

Now, when dealing with someone else's pet peeves we have two options. We can scoff and say “That bother's you? Don't be silly. Get over it,” or we can respect their opinion, have a little empathy (because you know how much you hate pet peeves) and try to correct your behavior . . . or at least lessen the frequency of said offense.


I'm trying to work on option two. After six years, I have discovered two pet peeves my husband has silently put up with: 1) I loose stuff all of the time/don't put things where they belong – my keys, wallet, phone, and more recently, laundry key-card and 2) I don't clear the timer on the microwave and I often open the microwave door before the cook time is finished. 

When we were first married, he did tell me he didn't like it when I squeezed the toothpaste from the middle. And he's right, it doesn't make much sense. He also mentioned once that the toilet paper should unroll from the top but we changed that after William was born. Both of these things he never got angry or said "You did it wrong!" or anything. He just fixed it. 

I appreciate his ability to not make a big deal of our differences and "just fix it" to his preferences. I can't say I've done the same for him, or anyone else for that matter. I asked him once if I had to worry about him keeping it all bottled it up inside and exploding one day . . . but I don't think that's his personality. 

I love finding new things out about my husband and our relationship. I wonder what the next six or sixty years will reveal!

No comments: