I have always had a tendency to blame myself. The words, ‘I’m so sorry’ slide so easily from between my teeth. My first assumption when something has gone awry is to trace through all of my actions and choices to find the root cause. It takes a while for me to consider that someone or something else may be culpable. Because I express my regret with a sweet, forgiveness-seeking smile followed by a characteristically self-deprecating grin, it’s not surprising that others will unknowingly (or knowingly) often excuse themselves of blame.
As far as social traits go, it’s not really a bad one to lay claim to. But in the realm of marriage and parenting, especially in my marriage, I’m starting to question whether I’ve allowed it to erode my self-esteem and my ability to assert myself, my desires, my needs.
As it turns out, Sandy has the opposite tendency. His first thought is what did someone else do. If he does something – say an accidental bump or knocking something over – if “I’m sorry” comes out of his mouth at all, it is always followed by, “but.” “I’m sorry, but if you hadn’t stood right there.” “I’m sorry, but you should have put that away.” Oh, it can be amusing when he retells some incident at work with his singular humor, or it can be eye-rollingly annoying when he’s yelling at other drivers and claiming they must be lost.
Over the years, I wonder how many times I have been the alternate scapegoat? It’s only recently that it has started to rankle me when I see him blame Eliot or Auden.
The blaming or self-blaming is indicative of the self-confidence that each of us possess. The assurity that we are right in our assumptions and arguments. This then manifests itself in our life compromises.
Every partnership survives on a steady diet of compromise. That is not at question. Throw in the house, the dogs, the kids, and the menu of concessions becomes a buffet. Sometimes it is natural. Sandy loves to go to plays and symphony. I love dances and circuses. We both enjoy action films – so that’s where we landed – movies. When we were two, we could occasionally, participate in the other activities with each other. I would struggle to stay awake through a symphony; he would deign to see a modern dance. But now with kids, time seems so slim. We cannot afford these alternating activities.
And, I accept that there will be these sorts of compromises. Over time they accumulate, though. A lot of it is simple things. For example, he snores. I’m a light sleeper. I have to wear earplugs because he won’t change his behavior (use nose strips etc). Ear plugs are fine most of the time, but they fall out, they give me ear infections, or sometimes they just hurt. But it’s my problem, so I deal with it. Other things are less obvious. We have what I jokingly refer to as “staff”: a dog walker, a gardener, house cleaners, contractors, because Sandy doesn’t like to do work around the house. Before kids, we did a lot of this stuff ourselves at the condo. Home improvement projects every weekend. I know that he really didn’t enjoy it, but he did it for me. Because I do enjoy it, but with the house the amount of work grew. With the kids it grew even more. Honestly, I can’t do all of it, so instead of fighting over what seems like a silly fight I can’t win, I give in to his wish. Same thing with having a kid in private school, or the charities to which we donate (or mostly stopped donating), or no longer volunteering, or generally living according to values of environmentalism that I hold so dear. No question he has made compromises as well. I am sure he could list dozens that I’ve not even noticed. What I wonder though is if those compromises have been less erosive of his self than mine. Yes, we now buy organic at Berkeley Bowl instead of shopping at Safeway like he used to. What part of his soul was impacted by that choice? Perhaps it has been, I don’t know.
I apologized yesterday to him in an email for being an emotional fuckup because I’ve been so all of the place, but then I realize I just keep perpetuating this idea that it’s all my fault. A few weeks ago, Lee and Gwen came over for dinner and at some point the conversation focused on alternative medicine. The debate between Sandy and I reached a stalemate that had me flying up to our room to sob because I realized there was no convincing him to even consider something that wasn’t part of his world view. Over time, I stop feeling like it is worth the argument. I don’t have the energy anymore. I just assume that I’m in the wrong.
What surprises me is that my entire childhood I could not comprehend how my mother had completely sublimated her needs and her interests and her wants for the sake of my father’s choices. I thought to myself, I’m never going to be that woman. I will be my own woman.
And frankly, when Sandy met me, I think I was. Undoubtedly, I had the same neurotic tendencies, but the zeal that I brought to our work environment, the steadfast, “No,” that I repeated to his requests to host a campus-wide search engine, those had to hold some appeal to him. I wonder how he even lives with me.