Hot sauce with a message
Red hot sauce dripped down the wire refrigerator shelf onto the quart of heavy cream below. A small, yellow, cast iron pot was tipped sideways, spilling the sauce.
“What happened here?!” I said.
“Probably an accident,” my husband said. Maybe. I pictured one of my kids roughly shoving containers around to get at the chocolate syrup.
“Probably someone got so angry with the stuff in the fridge that they didn’t care what damage they did,” I grumbled.
Sometimes I am struck by the words that come out of my mouth. I’m an avid believer that my kids follow my example. If I am chastising them about a particular behavior, there’s a good chance they learned that behavior from me. Plenty of times, I’ve caught myself shouting, “Stop shouting!”
I thought about my complaint about the hot sauce, and turned my words back on myself. Do I ever get so angry about something, that I don’t care what damage is caused by my reaction?
Yes, I sure do. I get angry and assault my kids with my scolding words and sarcastic comments. I’m so absorbed with my own annoyance, that I often don’t notice how I am affecting them. I do care what damage I’m doing, but sometimes only in retrospect. I made a mental note to myself:
“Notice what damage I am doing when I feel angry.”
“Knowing is half the battle”
Of course, I expect that the noticing will lead to correcting the problem. But as they used to say on the GI Joe cartoons, “Knowing is half the battle.” The other half is cleaning up the mess, whether it’s hot sauce or parenting blunders.
What do you think? I like feedback.
