Just a Little Peevish?

I’ve been bragging to my friends of late that I have been virtually unspankable. Okay, I confess, that's not entirely true.  Spankable behavior has been mainly due to thoughtlessness, and my unwillingness to consider his feelings in my actions and decisions. When B’Man needs me to take care of a particular task during the day or asks that I refrain from a certain behavior that’s has the potential to drive him to drink, The least I can do is take it seriously and put some real effort into it.

Sometimes I fail miserably, and B’Man can immediately tell if it was through a willful disobedience and laziness, or if it was one of my attention deficit oversights. For the latter, he will usually smile and afford me grace and mercy. But there will be those times when I will become irritated by the reminder.

Case in point:  I have been sufficiently warned that I am to keep the hall closet door closed. The hall is narrow, B’Man’s shoulders are broad, and it’s inconvenient and uncomfortable for him. About a dozen trips bent over the kitchen counter and the sting from a wooden spoon have forged a habit of staying mindful of that door. Rarely do I hear the squeak of the closet door hinges from another room, the signal that I have been negligent. On those rare occasions, I can react in one of two ways. Usually, I’ll drop what I’m doing, run into the hall, my mouth agape, and my hands on my face like that picture of Macaulay Culkin in Home Alone. I might giggle nervously, profusely apologize, and rack my brain as to when I opened the damned thing in the first place. He’ll watch me, assess my body language, check the way I nervously bite my lip, note the genuine surprise in my eyes, and hear the confusion in my voice. I will see in him the signs of a softened heart and a merciful reprieve. He’ll drop his head and his shoulders will bounce up and down as he chuckles to himself. “That’s okay, Babe. Try and pay attention to that, okay?” he’ll say. I’ll kiss him appreciatively, and we’ll move on.

But there will be other times. I’ll hear the squeak of the closet door hinges, and I’ll immediately feel irritated. Irritated at myself for forgetting, and irritated B’Man for bringing it up. Why can’t he just close the damned thing himself and lay off me? He’ll wait a moment for my apologetic, submissive reaction to the offending sound, and when I don’t show up, he’ll come looking for me. He may find me in the kitchen, my body language telling quite a different story. I’ll be standing erect, defiant. My eyes will shoot daggers at him, insolence dripping from my words. I’ll say something really stupid, like, “get over yourself.”

B’Man doesn’t say a word. He reaches for the crock on the counter, and grabs the biggest, heaviest wooden spoon in the arsenal. Suddenly, I realize what I’ve just done, and I can feel the muscles in my face relaxing, moving from an expression of anger to one of sincere remorse. He gently touches my shoulder, turns me around, and I bend over with almost no effort at all on his part. He doesn’t have to tell me what to do… I know the drill. My thumbs will slip into my waist band, and my pants and panties will slide to my thighs. The sting of the wooden spoon to my sit spots is especially painful, I suspect because of the extra infraction of my smart mouth. I might get five or six hard swats from this, and the burn, coupled with my contrition will cause my tear ducts to shoot like tiny water pistols. When he’s done, he’ll drop the spoon on the counter next to me. No more words have to be said.

B’Man’s pet peeves are all pretty much handled the same way.  Keep, the kitchen cabinets closed, keep the remotes in their respective rooms, close out the browser on the computer…

And now there’s a new one.

Well it’s not really new, it’s one of those things B’Man’s been nagging me about for years, and I never really paid that close attention. Now with the advent of the wooden spoon, I’ll probably be more mindful of this particular irritation that I’ve been ignoring for years.

This is a picture of our kitchen. As you can see, at the end of the counter on the right, there is a recycle bin. Now don’t ask me why I keep doing this… I honestly don’t know. But whenever I empty a bottle or a can or a jar, instead of dropping it into the recycle bin, I’ll leave it on the counter. And there it will sit for hours until I clean the kitchen. This drives B’Man absolutely out of his mind. He’s tried to keep a sense of humor about it. He’s teased me, begged me, and made empty threats. He’s done. It is now officially a spankable offense. In the past month there have been at least seven or eight wooden spoon incidents concerning this issue, and I’m unnerved at how often I lose sight of that directive. Apparently it's unnerving him too, because he's not giving me those acts of mercy, regardless of my attitude.

Just a few days ago as I sat in the easy chair on the right side of the picture with my laptop on my knees.  I was chatting in instant messenger with Kady about this very subject, and explaining how I’ve got some kind of mental block in this area. When she asked how the counter looked now, I assured her that I was in the clear, and that I had just finished polishing the marble to a perfect shine. At that moment, B’Man walked in the door, dropped his briefcase, kissed me hello, and shifted his eyes over to the shiny counter where there sat… the lone paper towel that I used to buff the marble with. It never made it into the recycle bin.

*Sigh*  This is going to be a long winter.