Large pieces of life gradually become ledger books. I often thought marriage became an enormous ledger (you know - I cleaned the kitchen last time...I get to be a bitch today because you were a toad yesterday...).
SCA fouls up the ledgers. It knocks our routine relationships out of balance. How much we care about different parts of our lives shifts, sometimes in small ways and other times closer to volcanically. Eruptions. Sometimes it seems like a total disorientation. Upside down. Planet gone wobbly.
Pre-SCA, when we had a spat (I was mocked for using that word, but I like it - it's a wonderful word) - in a spat or argument or real fight, we measured our next action, at least in part, with one eye on that mental ledger. I apologized first last time.... OR....he was more wrong than I was here, so he has to apologize first. ...OR he was really wrong this time - nothing short of flowers will work.
Since the SCA, it seems the minor disturbances are unchanged - I may withhold an apology or a gesture to make sure the delicate balance does not get too far out of whack. But on the big ones, where a relationship or at least harmony is at stake - I sometimes am almost oblivious to that balance. It doesn't matter to me who was more wrong. It doesn't matter to me if I over-apologize or meet more than halfway. Doesn't even matter if I risk going where I am not welcome. The chance at preserving or improving an important relationship trumps book-balancing. Post SCA, my tolerance for regrets has sunk to near zero; if I can avoid regretting an action or inaction, I am going to. And really - making the first step towards reconciliation or taking the larger step - these are rarely the sources of our regrets.
We all know life is short. We SCA survivors know it can be starkly, coldly short. Blink of an eye short. May not wake up tomorrow short. That next electrical disruption can happen in the next 5 minutes. Or in 20 years. One thing is certain; regrets are not how we want to spend our time. If I embarrass myself - who gives a damn.
Photo courtesy of an un-friend.
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