Family Language

 Today I have a bad attitude.  Everything is on my nerves.  I have the patience of an ant.  Instead of saying what is bothering me, I begin to use my special family language.

First, my husband comes home from work, and I commence with an evil glare.  The look that tells him he has no chance at saying anything right.  I ask him,” What do you want for dinner?”  At this point he knows there is no right answers but says sweetly,” what ever you want darling!”  My answer with the dirty look ready to fire, “You can never answer a question can you?” There you have it, I have created a no win situation.

Why do I really have this bad attitude?  Well, for starters, I am sure that I have gained three pounds.  Yep, a whole three pounds!  When you are my height, which is NOT tall, three pounds might as well be around twenty, because that is how it feels.  Then on top of that, the evil mirror makes all my clothes look larger in the belly region.  I have no doubt that the three pounds stems from ALL the left over birthday cake and ice cream I ate.  I have NO WILL POWER when it comes to cake.  I should probably include chocolate here as well.

Then if you happen to have read my blog from yesterday, my question is, why?  It might have been the most boring thing ever written.  It was so bad that it has bothered me all day.  I mean really, I should have not only waited, but also never even begun that one!  I realize I will have a few bad ones here and there, but this one seems to be extremely painful for me.  Not even, my loving aunt had a nice word to say about it.  As far as family language: no words are code for no good! 

While I am complaining, yesterday my blood sugar was 300 all day.  For those of you who don’t speak diabetes, that is NOT good.  I miscalculated the carbs I ate at lunch.  It threw my whole day off, rendering me tired; which is what high blood sugar does to me.  It makes me tired and irritable.  The weird thing is that when it came time for bed, I had a hard time sleeping.  At that point, I was worried about my blood sugar, and the crummy blog I had actually just posted. Oy vey…what was I thinking!

To wrap up my day, I think I may have disappointed my mother-in-law.  A little background info here; my mother-in-law is the sweetest, most thoughtful, and most self-sacrificing person I know.  Granted there are times that we have mother-in-law moments.  We refer to those as SUEGRA moments.  Suegra is the Spanish word for mother-in-law.  She thinks it is the ugliest sounding word and is convinced that it really means EVIL mother-in-law!  Another piece of information you need to know is that I work for my mother-in-law.  Yes, I know it sounds a little crazy.  BUT WAIT there is more, I also live directly across the street from her!  Today, my boss AKA my mother-in-law and I were discussing my work schedule.  I was less than enthusiastic about working on Friday, and I think that it bothered her because; she has been very gracious with my schedule this summer.  That is to say, I have not worked much.

Add all these things together and you get the reason for family language.  Family language defined as dirty looks, short tempers, and the picking of unnecessary fights.  This is the result of a bad attitude.  Family is the place where you should feel safe, a place of love and support, but I find that sometimes family is where you let it all go.  The total stranger can often get more courtesy than is extended between family.  I am not saying that any of this is right, what I am saying is, is that sometimes it is easier to be nice to a stranger, than to admit to yourself or your family that you are wrong.

Because of my bad attitude, I am reminded of Jesus’ command to Love one another.  All the mess of daily life, He has offered the perfect advice.  He has given the perfect example, and perfect forgiveness.  Now if only, I can remember to give Love instead of dirty looks when after 9 years of marriage I trip over the boots my husband has taken off in the same spot for 9 years.  LORD help me!