WAR OR PEACE

     It's 12:42 in the morning. I had a long day. 
     In the evening Taka suddenly decided to take me out to dinner. That didn't happen in a long time. We live as roommates with different schedules and agendas. To tell the truth, I already began to prepare myself to a final separation from him. But there he was, hugging me and telling me about his plan to go out!
     We went to a Vietnamese place nearby. I was driving. On the way Taka told me, he could drive too, because "Beer already expired". 

     I asked him a few times to repeat that. In my mind I made a few different explanations to his sentence. Did he mean, the beer he drank was bad, and he now had a reaction to it? What else could it possibly mean?!
     It turned out in the end, Taka meant, the alcohol from drinking beer already left his system, so he could drive. Now, would you be able to decipher his statement?
     We've been together for more than 20 years. Our communication got a little better lately. He still either freezes and refuses to repeat some things I don't understand from the first time he says them, or screams them out at me. 
      I am so used to such treatment, that many times it doesn't even occur to me to confront Taka at times like that. In Al Anon I learned though: "We get, what we tolerate", and Mr. P. often reminds me that we have to "Pop the pimple" (sorry for this graphic metaphor), which means, we have to face and confront someone, who treats us unfairly.
     The situation with the "expired beer" was more funny than annoying, so we went on to the restaurant without fighting. 
     I am sure, Taka has a huge list of things that hurt or annoy him in my behavior. I still feel like I always have to swallow, what he dishes out, and put my fake face on. I am getting better at "popping the pimple", but it's too hard to constantly be in a state of war with my husband.