Anger

When I decided to attend my high school reunion in Ohio, I decided I should make the most of the trip and visit two of my brothers who also live in the Midwest: Andy who lives in Iowa, and Mike who lives in Michigan. I allocated two weeks for this expedition so that I would have time to travel, time to visit and time to recover from traveling. I find I need a day to recover from a day's worth of traveling, whether by car or by plane.

The reunion and the visit with Andy went well, and then I drove to Michigan to see Mike. I arrived on a Saturday evening. Sunday afternoon we went for bike ride into downtown. On the way back I stop to rest for a minute and Mike starts giving me a bad time, he runs through his rant, and then he rides off. Not only am I tired, now I am depressed. I resolve to pack and leave as soon as I get back to the house. I am tired when I finally get back and think I will just take a short nap before I go. Mike brings me a sandwich and apologizes, and I think, okay, I can stay on.

The next morning though he is on me again, not for what I am doing, but simply for what I am thinking. That tears it. I refrain from making any response because A) it would have been a rude remark, and B) it would have just fueled the fire. I throw my clothes in my bag and leave.

The interesting part in all this is that it only took a minute or two of Mike's tirade (five minutes if you count both incidents) before I was ready to vacate the premises. Funny how a few little remarks can have such a strong effect. That fact that we have history may have laid the ground work for this incident, but I don't think so.

I have tried arguing with people before, and it generally does not work. Each becomes more entrenched in their position and continues to yell louder until it escalates into a fight or they both run out of steam.

I read something once about how with some families, the members of the family should live in different states and write letters to each other once a year, and with some families, they should live in different states and write letters to each other and then tear them up. I wonder if they were talking about us.