It's the little things...

Sometimes, it is the little inconsequential things that make my blood boil over, and cause warning signals to flash in my head that read something like "YOU CANNOT POSSIBLY STAY MARRIED TO THIS PERSON!"

Throwing a costume together for Halloween the other day, privately congratulating myself because it was a whole hour before the party began, I'd asked my daughter to retrieve a wig that she had commandeered for her dress up box, and she dutifully did so. When she returned with it, we all immediately started taking turns trying it on, laughing as we all experimented with being blond bombshells.

In the midst of this, husband says, "Tell her thank you for getting that for you."

If I was, say, invariably impolite to my children, I would have heeded this reminder. But I am not. In fact, I more often am exceedingly polite, very quick to thank them for chores or any act of kindness, for that matter, in an effort to propagate good behavior.

Lost in the moment, manners escaped me, and I'm fine with that. I can live with myself. In fact, if I could live it over, I would even choose to live it the exact same way, and my daughter would be none the wiser. Until, of course, husband reminds us all that manners were not adhered to during this transaction. Thanks for that completely useless comment, honey, what would I do without you?

At the time, I simply said, like a robot, "Thanks, sugar". In a private moment later I told him I don't need to be treated like a child, thank you very much. And he replied, well, you should have said thank you. So in short, he would do the exact same thing again, too.

When the kids were little and he happened to call when we were at the park, I remember him giving me warning lectures that went something like, "You have to watch them REALLY carefully! Don't let them out of your sight for ONE second! Don't let her hang upside down from the monkey bars, it's too dangerous!" and so on. Our therapist has explained this behavior as typical of control freaks (okay, maybe the proper term is Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, whatever...) who attempt to control what is out of their control by issuing orders, and I'm supposed to simply let him say his piece (as hard as that may be).

Where our child's safety is concerned, even though it drives me nuts since I have yet to (god forbid) lose a child or even experience much more than a scraped knee, at least it is partially excusable - he only wants to protect what he loves most in life. Now that they are older, it manifests differently. For instance, he ALWAYS asks, "Is that movie appropriate?", no matter what Disney or cartoon feature I have brought home from the movie store. It is so tiring, but I tell myself these are little things.

But neglecting to say thank you, perhaps once out of a hundred times? I'm trying to rationalize that one, but having serious trouble. Is he my husband, or my mother? His role in my life is blurred by this image, and no offense to my mother, but I don't want to sleep with her.