Recently I’ve witnessed examples in several marriages and relationships, where trivial incidents have been blown out of all proportion. What started as a minor irritation or amusing incident escalated and became a drama of mammoth proportions, which left behind a wake of hurt feelings, accusations, lack of understanding and forgiveness, and resulted in irreconcilable differences. All because one person wasn’t able to say sorry and apologize.
In the end, it doesn’t matter who’s right and who’s wrong. What matters is that someone apologizes and stops the situation from turning into a major drama. It’s no good standing on your dig, just because you believe you’re right, when you end up standing there alone. Being right is small comfort then. How much better to apologize, reconcile and talk the problem through.
Years ago I remember hearing a Jungle Doctor story about ‘little leopards become big leopards and big leopards kill.’ We might rephrase that slightly to say, ‘little problems become big problems and big problems can kill a marriage.’ Yes, it seems once again Mary Ann and I have been thinking along similar lines, which only emphasizes what an important issue this is in marriage.
Yesterday Mick, being helpful, put the washing in the machine for me as I was busy. When I went to take it out, I found shredded tissue all over the clothes. Now it could have turned into a blame game. ‘Why didn’t you check the pockets before you put them in,’ etc.
Yes, I was the one responsible for the tissue. The thing is we have different ideas. I always check pockets for tissues as I’m putting the clothes in the washing machine, whereas Mick assumed I did as he does and takes tissues out before clothes go in the laundry hamper. It was simply a case of two people with different ideas about how to do something.
I pulled out the crumbled bits of tissue I could find and re-washed the clothes, which got rid of most of the tissue. Problem solved. In the end, it wasn’t a major issue but it had the potential to turn that way if reactions had been different.
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