The High Road

   
     Hey all!  I feel like I've been out of it for a while.  It probably hasn't been that long, but since the last few months have been all about flooring renovations and Matt being gone a lot and Prom and end-of-the-year things- with a little flu bug thrown in to the mix- I've learned a few things.  One is that time is weird.  Why does it feel like we've been working on our floors for a decade when it's only been a month and a half ?(Only a month and a half? Snort.) And how is it that 9 attended his Senior Prom when it feels like I just met him as a Kindergartner. There's no way that could have been more than five years ago.  Could it have been? 
     So weird. 
    The other thing I learned is that there is some kind of weird correlation between my bouts with the flu and the appearance of Hamburger Helper commercials.  Seriously. NO ONE with an upset stomach needs to see that many closeups of ground meat floating in fake cheese.  
     Anyway.  I wrote this post a year ago and never published it because I didn't have a way to finish it. Yet it's always stayed in the back of my mind because it's about a topic that is often relevant to my life.  It's about taking the high road.  Or not taking the high road.  It's also about being a grown-up and how much it blows at times.  Like I said, I didn't have a way to finish it.... until tonight.  Tonight there was an incident at the Costco Gas Station and I swear to you guys, it was like God came down and said "BAM! There's your ending!" And I was all, "Whoa, Lord.  You are SO right! Thanks, man." 
(Cause in my head, God is hip like that.) 
     Anyway.  Enough talking.  Here's the original post.  I'll jump back in to finish it off with the Costco story.  See you all there. 
     (Um, I mean, I'll see you at the end of the post, not at Costco.  Just clarifying in case you are confused- which I wouldn't blame you for.)
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     Have you guys ever taken the Meyers Briggs Personality Test? I'm pretty sure anyone who's taken a Psych 101 course has taken the Meyers Brigg. I've taken it a few different times in my life, and the one thing that has remained consistent throughout the years is that I've always scored as far over as one can get on the "Feeler" side. That means I make judgements based on my feelings, rather than logical reasoning.  Shocker, right? I'll give you a minute to pick your jaw up off the floor. 
Kidding.  Logic and I have never been simpatico. My feelings are big, big, big.  Sometimes too big.  Often times too big.  That's one of the reasons I like writing..... writing often shrinks them down into a manageable perspective.  
     And while my big emotions are one of the things I treasure about myself, as I've matured I've also become hyper aware of some of the consequences of letting my feelings all hang out- especially the negative ones.  For one, sometimes it freaks people out.  Two, sometimes it gets me in trouble.  Three, it's often a terrible way to model appropriate behavior, especially....say.... on the road when your children are in the car with you.  

     So yeah, over the last ten years I've become much better at handling my emotions.  But in the process of reigning my emotions in, I've been swallowing a lot of anger.  That's probably why it's such a recurring theme in so many of my posts. And I've just spent a lot of time lately wondering what it is all you normal people do with your anger?  Because while I get that loosing it on somebody just reflects poorly on you and sends negative energy out into the world, I'm finding that I still feel punished after handling a situation the "mature and responsible" way because I end up being angry for days.  

    For example, a few weeks ago, my sister and I took our kids out for a hike at a nearby trail.  The hike follows the fault line out here for a while before ending at an oasis surrounded by palm trees.  It was a great day- not too warm, not too hot- and the trail meandered up and downhill just enough to make the change in scenery interesting. The kids, as kids do, were stopping every few minutes to pick up a rock, a stick, a chewed piece of bubble gum…. any random item they found interesting.  Sara and I were taking our time, intermittently stopping our conversation to herd the kids back together if a few fell too far behind.

    I'm telling you all this to point out that it was a great day.  We were all having fun, until the "incident".  As we got closer to the end of the trail, I turned around to warn the kids that they would need to drop anything they had collected before we left the path.  Then Sara and I picked up our conversation again.  A few minutes later, an older couple passed our group walking at a brisk pace.  As they passed, the older lady turned and to my surprise, starting scolding Roo. 
 “You know what, little girl?”  she said.  “You shouldn’t throw sticks!  Don't you know that?"
Roo, who is pretty shy around strangers most of the time, didn’t answer.  As for me, I’m used to strangers stopping to engage Roo in conversation, but up to that point it had always been because she’s cute.  It took me an extra second to figure out that wasn’t the case here.

     The lady continued on. “You shouldn’t throw sticks because they hurt people!”  And she continued to rant at Roo while I tried to figure out what the hell was going on. Being a former elementary school teacher, I’m totally comfortable with calling out other kids on their bad behavior, but if their parents are around, I leave them to it OR I talk to the parents.  This lady just lit into my kid while I was standing there and didn’t bother to clue me in as to what she was so angry about.  A quick glance at my sister proved that she was just as confused as I was.

     “I’ll take care of it.  Thank you.” I said, swooping in to grab Roo’s hand.  Admittedly, the annoyance I was feeling came through in my tone. 

     “GOOD!” the lady snapped.  Then she stomped away.

     I leaned over to interrogate Roo.   According to the other kids, the couple had come from behind to pass our group and as they did, Roo threw her (small, 8 inch) stick to the side.  It hit the lady in her shin as she was passing.  So, bottom line, it was an accident.  As far as I could tell, the lady was not bleeding.  She was not limping.  Being that she was an adult and Roo was 4, I would think that she’d be able to see that it was an accident.  At best, she could have let me know and I would’ve made Roo apologize to her because yes, absolutely, Roo should learn to be aware of what’s around her before she throws things.

     But again, she’s four.  She’s learning.  It was an accident. 

     I reprimanded Roo by telling her she needed to be aware of her surroundings, but inside I was seething.  I felt like that one incident ruined a perfectly nice day.  I wanted to pick up a stick and throw it at the lady’s head.  I wanted to run ahead and confront her.  I wanted to spit insults into her face.   I wanted to run her over with my car.  All these things I wanted to do, yet when I looked at the situation without all the crazy making emotions, I saw that I had handled it in the most mature, adult manner possible.  I had kept my temper, got rid of the lady quickly, addressed the situation with the kids, and explained why the old witch lady went batshit was angry.
     Ahem.

     In the end though, none of that mattered.  Taking the high road didn't make me feel any better.  I was still pissed as all hell.  And it stayed with me for DAYS.  

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     That's where I ended the post when I wrote it last year.  Then, tonight at Costco Gas, I had a confrontation with another person in which I TOTALLY did not take the high road.  I gave this rude, rude woman a piece of my mind and told her she was a miserable person and I may or may not have given her a nice, long, extended look at my middle finger.  I wrote out every little detail for you in an indignant huff, but then I deleted it all because I realized that sharing the whole thing with the world is not going to make me any more right.  Also, I realized that you may not care about my drama as much as I want you to and I want to avoid being annoyed by that because in this case, I WAS SO RIGHT.
     I also deleted it because I'm already well over 1000 words. You're welcome, and don't worry.  I'll wrap this up.
     Here's what I'm taking away from this.... whether I take the high road or jump off of it with both feet, I still feel angry and frustrated at other people.  'Cause here's the thing about the high road-no one ever says, "Hey, good job taking the high road!"  And I feel like that's wrong.  YOU GUYS.  We need to tell people how awesome they are when they take the high road becaaaaaaauuuuuuse........(deep breath) BECAUSE when you take the high road over and over and over and no one ever acknowledges how hard that is, it starts to feel like the stupid people are winning.  And tonight, in my moment of confrontation at the gas station, I could not bear the thought of letting the stupid people win again.  This resulted in me acting beneath myself, which yeah, I feel bad about.  I guess that should be my motivation for staying on the high road.  However, I'd like to think that perhaps, maybe, if someone were there with me when the incident occurred, I would've handled it better and they would've patted me on the back and said, "Good job, sistah.  That woman was ridiculous.  Nice job taking the high road with her."

Because sometimes that's all you need to hear.