there is no crying over spilt milk

It was life or death. I say this all the time to the kids I watch. Was it life or death? Was it a small or big problem? Will you d-i-e (spelling it out)? Will you live if we do it this way? What could wait until tomorrow? It’s all about perspective and maybe it’s insensitive to play around with this concept of life and death. Its more the ability to have perspective-is this something we can live through, is this something we can figure out? So when the water or milk spills at dinner more often then not and K starts to profusely apologize, I say calmly- is this a big or small problem? He meekly answers, a small problem. But why don’t you yell at me when I do it? He asks as if I hold the answers. Because every adult is different and makes different choices but really. Maybe they just are tired or burnt out and patience left them yesterday because as caregivers there is no perfection. There can’t be. The reason I am so calm about spilling things is because I still do. I am a spiller. In the office, when I worked in one, people would be amazed if I made it through the day without my standard coffee stain somewhere on my business professional clothes of the jcrew and ann taylor and once I got a raise maybe some benetton assortment. I don’t miss those clothes. I don’t miss that life.

My father yelled at me regularly for spilling the milk- loud explosive yells and then the God Damn it or Shit or some other swear word. He would jump up and yell and sometimes slam his hand down. So I would profusely say sorry and my heart would beat, beat hard and I would feel bad. But it was just an accident. It was life or death. It felt that way. But really it was spilt milk. My dad wasn’t mad at me. He was mad at someone else or because he hated his job. So when the milk spilt he yelled at me, regularly. So I am sensitive about this spilling thing. And that might be why I stay so calm when the kids do it. There is no crying over spilt milk I say. When I see the glass getting close to their elbows as we talk over our dinner, I remind, them stay away from the splash zone. I try to make it light. It was life or death.

Spilling for me is a deal breaker. If you yell when someone makes a mistake, a real mistake, I can’t help but feel like the little girl again. I can’t help but feel like it’s life or death. So when I spilled the beer by accident more than once. More than once. Because I am a spiller. He got mad at me. But unlike the child I once was I didn’t curl up into the fetal, I apologized and tried to fix it. Something that is not mean or vile or intentional should be easily forgiven. Accidents are accidents. It was life or death only in the way we handle it.