sin of liberalism #211: judging armpit hair in yoga

thanks to nancy for sending me this link to this wonderful uk commercial for a razor with trimmer. we need better commercials here- someone get on it!

Shame on you I think. Shame on you for the false advertising. When the woman next to me at yoga lifts her sweaty arm against her leg twisting in the standing pose and I am welcomed with a huge not small even masculinity worthy armpit of hair- the hair of the armpit- it is coming towards my face. I don’t care normally I don’t. But shame on her for false advertising. When I placed my mat next to her for a moment. For the moment of class. I saw a typical yogi in the sf-any city for that matter. She is white. Curly hair a top her head. Short tight spandex shorts. Tank top with the sports bra exposed just enough. And two nicely cleanly shaved legs, perfectly done. False advertising. I say. See why you would shave your legs and not your pits is beyond me. Completely beyond me.

See your legs are hard to shave. The shape and curve of a woman’s leg-I am sure a guys-are hard to maneuver without a nick or miss of spot of hair. I remember once a guy I dated told me I had bristles on my legs. Don’t girls shave everyday? No I said. Not every day. It’s not as simple as a face and a dude can get away with out shaving that at all. So I don’t know why you would spend such time on the legs and say screw the easy part- the pits.

Because shame on you. I think you should own it and have hairy legs so that I can know that in the preview of looking at you that armpit full of hair might be heading toward my face when we are in yoga while you have a good sweat abrewing. It is just common courtesy. To let me know. You are a card carrying liberal but sometimes say non pc things when in the solitude of your home. Or you eat non organic on sundays or something. I guess shame on me to judge someone else’s armpit hair. All I could think was- wonder what she had going on downstairs. Because of her false advertising of her legs and the puff of sweaty hair at my face. I wonder what she does for her womanly area. If I was a dude and found two nicely shaved legs and then happened upon the 1970s show I would be pissed.

Shame. I guess body hair makes us feel shameful and judgeful and everyone is full of advice of how and when to shape it and shave and get rid of it and to grow it. I get it. We don’t have to wear bras. We don’t have to shave. We don’t have to marry. We don’t need to procreate. We can work. We can play. Women’s liberation still might have limits. Limits I don’t want to know or say. Aloud. Or in my head quietly yelling.

As I shamefully judge the pit next to me. I wonder what is it really about. The smell, the shock, the false advertising, the uncertainty, the not fitting in the box, or me not getting why you would shave your long whitish curvy legs and forget those pits. It doesn’t matter why because I have done my own examination of my body hair. And how I keep it.

I am a terrible shaver. Of my legs. I still miss spots and cut myself it doesn’t matter if I am over 30. I shave my pits more often than not-my pits have never gotten bushy like my mr. rodgers friend of the moment. And for my danger triangle. It depends a lot on what I have going on in terms of extracurricular. If I have a regular visitor, I keep things trim and shaved my own little personal triangle of love. I have tried shaving it all but it just got itchy from the shaving- kind of a buzz kill past the first day. Red bumps all you’re your vag not cute. Plus I felt naked like a 12 year old. I have waxed but never the whole thing that includes in between the checks of my ass- it freaks me out to have a stranger up there under bright florescent lights- saying open up more- might be worse than the gyno. That is saying a lot. And this is an open call to those in the universe in charge of the waxer and gyno services- please serve a cocktail at both this affairs from now on-thanks.

I remember once a guy who I dated told me you should trim and I thought I had. Fucking pornos and girls who shave it all the time that makes it hell for my little bit. A little bit or a little bit more a travesty. See I believe if you are lucky enough to be there you shouldn’t complain. Not at all. Just enjoy the ride. Because we all have bigger worries than how to shave this and that. We just want someone who loves us either way. But know know if you have taken a vacay from the shaving, you will in fact find someone to bed. When you least expect it. It happens. Every time. Maybe I should stop shaving.

alcoholic bones: playing the game of alcoholism

Playing the game. I was so very good at playing the game of an alcoholic. I once was. And it wasn’t until I recently tried a repeat offense-I realized I am a lapsed alcoholic as I am Catholic. There is no way of denying it. You can’t deny you used to be good it. But now one bottle of red puts me so far in the remission of a hangover-it’s depressing.

I used to play the game so well. So after I decided to have a liquid dinner of red wine-a full bottle and grabbing my emergency cigarettes-packed away randomly in the shared bathroom under the sink. I was trashed half way through. I used to drink a bottle of wine for breakfast and then go on to do the sobriety test of work. But not now.

I wake up to my computer that I fell asleep more like passed out to- it is on the ground. No big deal right until I look down and realize it’s on a broken plate. A broken plate that held my midnight snack-scratch that dinner of the poor woman’s quesadillas- find what you can in the fridge and voila white woman’s Mexican skills tested and served. Left over cheese from my roommate, abandoned corn tortillas and salsa that salsa is mine. No sour cream so I pretend by using plain yogurt to be healthy again. I am not. Then I find 4 jalapeños floating in mia jar in the back of the fridge. It filled me up and I forgot about it until. Until of course I woke up and found that I had passed out and pushed my computer to break my quesadilla plate into two. I am laughing. Maybe I am not as lapsed as I had thought.

I used to play the game of alcoholism so well. Finish work and the put it straight into my vein, whatever alcohol would do. Would do. No dinner. That would complicate things. Make me less drunk. And then the bumming of cigarettes from randoms. At that time I was a good drunk with the assistance of doses of anxiety meds I wasn’t supposed to drink on but I didn’t heed any attention to such warnings on labels too tiny to read, too tiny to care. I needed that iv drip to deal with me. To deal with my life. To keep going.

I was good at playing the game of an alcoholic by hooking up with randoms and not remembering exactly how and waking up to-oh shit how do I get out of this. I was good at hooking up with friends. I was good at stumbling and spilling and fighting when I needed to. Never physically just with my biting tongue. I was good at the apologies the next day. There always are. I was good at being a drunk. I never wanted to leave. Just keep drinking. Drinking and drinking so I could keep going. Going nowhere fast but not caring as I blew my high paid salary of miserableness on being miserable.

I was a drunk with the best of them. I used to have a tolerance. I used to slur but now now I try but fail. I used do the textbook things like miss work because of being hungover- actually I think those are the only times I called in. I would roll into work reeking of alcohol and I knew I smelt. I knew I might still be drunk.

What saved me other than my weak stomach? What saved me? Was a fight over chips I had one night. One night the fight over chips made me less of a social binge drinker and face the reality of being a drunk. A drunk. Playing the game of alcoholism- I was good at it- I miss it- I miss the simplicity of washing it all away.

sin of liberalism #7- i went to wal-mart. and bought something. a pregnancy test.

Don't tell me twice. Don’t tell me twice. That it is stupid. I know this of course. Of course I know this. But it’s not something I need to be told. Out loud. For I already know. I have known. Known all along. So. I only told someone as not to lie anymore. To myself. To you. To anyone. So how does one get this the first time around? So how does one get this a second time around?

Don’t tell me twice. It’s stupid to have unprotected sex. I know that of course I know. And it usually isn’t a problem. A problem for me. Me it isn’t. It isn’t something I do. Do until I usually know someone. Someone. But how well do we know anyone? Anyone. So I had unprotected sex with someone. Someone I probably shouldn’t. Shouldn’t have. Don't tell me twice. I already know. I already know. Now it was someone I knew. Someone I had been dating for awhile. But it happened. And the good news was. The good news was it was only the beginning. Not the end. The end could make all the difference.

Don't tell me twice. I know I could still be pregnant. I know about the possibilities- and the pre-ejaculation stuff- and all the things I am supposed to. Because those are easy to know. But to actually take them into consideration, consideration all the time, all the time is hard. Hard it is to be rational during sex. During sex to be rational is like to ask a woman to stop her love for chocolate or chips or good conversation when she most needs it- yay right.

So I fear pregnancy. Not because I really think I am pregnant. Because not once have I been. Don't tell me twice-I know birth control works-for I almost always use it. Use it. When I tell my acupuncturist that I am feeling emotional and she asked me could I be pregnant. I say well yes but no. And then as I lay back as I am poked with the needles in the same spot to calm my mind, to ease the pain in my mouse hand, to stop the possible headache, and to ground me. I wonder, I wonder what if I am pregnant? What if I am pregnant?

When I hit IKEA later with my friend and she drags me literally drags me to Wal-mart. Because I stopped going to Wal-mart- I am a good educated liberal of course. It is a sin, a sin one must not commit. Killing someone might be okay- but going to Wal-mart unforgivable. I decide instead of allowing this to play around in my head on the ping pong table or pin ball around, that I will find out in this Wal-mart, this Wal-mart bathroom in Oakland if I am pregnant or not. Pregnant or not. How white trash? How worth writing about? Producing material while going through the motions as not to freak myself out. Freak myself out. Because peeing on a pregnancy test on Wal-mart isn’t scary. I don’t feel alone. Think how many women have peed on the test and waited and waited and waited. Wait I did. Wait I will to be pregnant that is.

champange hands

so it was not intended that i would write /post about cocaine twice in a week but this is the piece my teacher choose to post on creative caffeine as my best piece written last week. another ten minute quick write- so without further ad0. . . champagne hands.

http://creativecaffeine.blogspot.com/2010/06/bubbling-over-kate-bueler.html

my cultural exchange of the korean massage- an anatomy lesson of a different kind

Now I have done the New York massage in tent of a room full of strangers. Acupressure melded into an Asian dialect-I am not sure exactly which one. It’s singing and loud in a rhythmic beat. It is cheap and I can walk more straight once I leave out the side street up the stairs onto the well-beaten path.

Now I have done Calistoga. The massage of politeness and English and crisp whiteness still near the mud. In your own private room of politeness. The mud. And the naked ladies. And then the spa last time I went to that it seemed you had to obese to work there. Which made me and my friend feel like they must be saying I hate them, those skinny bitches.

I have done the yoga massage studio massage. Which is a zen haven with the correct emblems out, smell of openness and acceptance, as you hear the yoga class next store in the yoga room. The jumps of the poses. The let go and breath. Then the telling of me how I walk wrong and I should work on it. It. Thanks ohm lady for that. How do you re-teach yourself to walk when you are in your 30’s? Namaste I say.

It all started in college. In a basement of my college surrounded by the fellow sweaty college athletes where I tried to relax amongst the baseball and soccer players. My table next to theirs. I closed my eyes to not see their ogling. But I could still hear the snickers. The bright florescent lights blinding and beaming. As I turned the corner after, I heard nice ass and tons of laughter.

So that is to say I am somewhat of a veteran at this massage thing. Massage thing. So the Korean massage. The Korean massage was unlike anything I have yet experienced. I gave over my clothes and received a pink oversized top and long cotton shorts stopping at my knee with an elastic waistband for ladies over 60’s. It left red and white indents around my midsection. I felt like I was in gym class in jr. high. No at a spa. There is a women’s section and men’s section.
Women go around naked in their section. I am assuming the guy’s room bottomless on their side.

We meet in the middle-the common area. The common area has small tinyish tables and food menus in Korean and English not proofread, group saunas clothing not optional, an ice room, and a room full of burberry pillows on a refrigerated floor with a huge plasma tv where people lay. I don’t know where I am but there is no windows, no whiteys but me oh and my brother, but he will be on his side, me on mine. I hear the background noise of languages I don’t know and the looks of others sometimes the quick look away and then the staring. Staring. I’m exotic again. In a windowless spa, in a common room with food and pillows, in my gym clothes of years past. Time to relax.

I walk into the women’s locker room to go the bathroom. The women who work there look at me like I’m lost. No, where can I find the food I ask. Where’s waldo I must look like. They smirk. I eat too much kim chi and spicy things I have no idea what they are which I will pay for later of course.

I went into the warm pool, which was the hottest pool I have been in. It is time for the treatment. Everyone is naked here and what I learn is- okay-I learn a lot. First of all, I am thankful for my body. And being comfortable with it, in it. Second, vital information such as observing others pubic hair regions occurred. I see there is a range of hairiness of the danger triangle from somewhat normalish hair to 1960’s freedom funk to the mohawk. I learn that although most Asian women are not hairy throughout their whole bodies, like us whiteys that they do in fact make up for lost ground downstairs. Now this might just be middle aged or older women of Korean decent or Asian decent. Not many youngins were there for my sample size of my research study. I was shocked by the amount of hair so distracting that it was hard to not stare. But I forced myself to look away. Away.

Another thing I learned was that nipples really vary. I know my own well. I know my friends sort of. Guys will love that. Ladies change in front of each other. And sometimes on spring breaks in Mexico maybe shower together not for an sexual revolution in the making but to get ready more quickly, to save water, to take advantage of the group shower. But some of this nipples were shocking. Shockingly big and wide and long, one woman almost took me out with hers. Yes sir, I was taking out by a massive nipple to the eye. I was in a Korean spa. Oh good, to hear, this happens a lot. My ER visit plays on the reel of my mind. I look down-mine felt small and pinkish and childlike in comparison. But they are mine.

So the massage, the massage was kind of sort of out of this world. I told you I was a veteran but never, never did I ever experience anything like this. First of all you are in a group room, room with drains and water and tubs of water in huge plastic trashcans. There are towels and smells and constant movement. Bright lights. Tables-plastic-are grouped together in a sardine fashion and the ladies taking care of you wear black bras and underwear and don’t speak English. Now I’ll be honest but little was left to the imagination and this wasn’t a dream sequence out of a western man’s fantasy, no these ladies weren’t. They start with the scrub. The scrub I thought would be relaxing hurts like hell. It’s like someone took a brillo pad a brillo pad to your entire, I repeat ENTIRE, body. I close my eyes and smell the smell of my own dead flesh. Gross. Water rushes over me. I turn over and over and once I start to get used to the burning until the brillo is going for my crack my butt, I jump, and scream, and clench my cheeks and my lady laughs. We are laughing, the universal language translator, the laughter. Every time I would laugh, everyone-workers and clients all laughed. When she was scrubbing my bikini area or my feet. The laughter again and the rounds would begin.

So the actual massage did little to relax me. After the skin was scrubbed off my body and washed off my table and down the drain it went. Round and round. Yes now for the massage. But I had a
preview of what was to come and it wasn’t pretty-no it wasn’t. I’m fucked. The woman next to me is the largest and in chargest Asian woman I have ever laid my eyes upon. Her areolas are the size of my one breast- they are huge. And they are shaking next to me. Back and forth they go. She has been shaken by her masseuse next to me. The flesh back and forth. Her breasts shaking rapidly. I close my eyes tight.

Now it’s my turn, the oil is rubbed, rubbed all over my body actually splashed and thrown. Then the shaking and the intermittent pounding. I need a seatbelt, a sports bra for this ladies technique. It’s so slippery I am fearful I might slide right off the table. The shaking, the constant shaking is making me nervous and I might have a panic attack. This is the polar opposite of relaxing, this is cultural exchange gone wrong. Terribly wrong. Then there is the flipping back and forth. And a mask that is making my face itch. But I can’t tell her softer or what is the strange stuff you put in my face. What I would do for a waterproof pocket Korean dictionary or as the modern folk would say a waterproof I phone or droid, what I would do. She takes the mask off and all she keeps saying is irritation, irritation, irritation and pours milk on my face. She knows irritation. Does she understand stay away from my butt hole, or bikini area or please don’t tenderize me like meat. It’s over and I feel strangely relaxed or relieved I’m not sure which.

Off to put on my gym clothes and try and find my brother who was banished to the male section. He probably has lost his shit and returned to his mobsteresque car for relief of his womb. No he feel asleep the only white man in sight in a sea of yellow and brown- he was easy to spot, he looked like a giant with long curly hair. He had a burberry pillow under him, he actually was asleep. We went into the co-ed sauna- there in Korean letters and in English-no talk here-which means whisper. And grade your papers here. Yes, I saw a man, a professor, grade his papers, final exams for a college class in a co-ed sauna with a blue gym suit, spa issued on of course. I started laughing so hard I had to leave. It made me think about all the weird places my professors might have graded my papers. So I left soon after my green tea bubble tea. It had been four hours. Day almost over.

When I told people I went to get a Korean spa people laugh and ask about happy endings. The happy ending didn’t come in their over-sexualized hasty generalized racialized assumption of a question or a statement- I am sure it would cost more than 70 dollars if that was the case-no my happy ending was the end and I was happy.

awkward am

Almost everyone has experienced the should I stay, should I go, should I kick him out, should I ask her to stay-the inner dialogue of the tug of the war of the morning. It’s hard, hard to know when to have someone stay, stay as long as they want, as long as you want, maybe until the next day. Next day. Awkward ams come in all forms and I learned this past Tuesday as I began my day. Awkward Tuesday was brought to you by no other than me. It wasn’t the typical awkward a.m. of new lovers-no it was me reliving embarrassment of a teenager. It was a reminder I too have blown off guys. I felt 15 again. Taking hours to figure out to wear and do my hair, and turning red at the wrong times, and just desperately wanting to be accepted. We all need reminders we too can be dicks. So I got mine this week. Thanks so much for that memo, duly noted.

I walked into to my local stomping ground of a coffee shop to get my coffee to begin my day. As I poured the makings of a great coffee together, I saw a man in the light, a man who I blew off. Shit is all I can think. And my face tightens into a uncomfortable pretend smile smirk. He asked me out in person and in text. I had made plans but then lied to him about some other responsibility I had. He asked me to come over to house for a fire for a first date. Which didn’t settle well with me. I must not have be into him. But really I was just into someone else- limbo again we were in. I don’t know why I planned a second date. Date. But I flaked on that one too. I should have just said, said something like I am seeing someone else or I’m busy or something. But instead I let his last text of I was thinking of you go to my response of radio silence. So when I saw him, I felt awful because what do you say. Say. I said nothing, I left without a lid on my coffee and prayed and laughed nervously while speed walking across the street dodging the cars and the J church and hoped he didn’t come after me. He didn’t. I felt like a dick. I guess I blow off people too. It is easier to remember when someone has stopped taking your calls or emails or breaks things off via myspace or stands you up or dumps you double-parked. Those are easier to remember. Funny how that works.

So I thought I was free of running into my most recent second possibility of stretching my dating muscles into becoming a puma-a cougar in training. First a 26 year old. Which might be worth an attempt at rationalization. But this guy was 23. I know you guys do it all the time. Go for a younger counterpart. But my brother is 23. I even have limits. He asked me out via text. Text. Somewhat of a generational divide of sorts. I wanted to respond to him in person. I am an idiot. I should have texted him back. Oh no worries, right after the coffee incident I went to class and there he was sitting in my seat, my seat and it wasn’t even his class. I am reliving high school in my 30’s. Then there was an awkward exchange of hi, what are doing here, and me tripping on my desk. I was red again. In high school. Again. He promptly left. I felt like an asshole again and it was only 11 in the morning. This time I wanted to face the music, but not like this.


In my self-reflection I too must admit that I have in fact blown off people, blown off the opposite sex, guys that have liked me, and my actions have not always been as gracefully as I would like done to me. And I have been doing it for years. Years. Guys used to write me love letters and show up at my work and do sweet amazing things like a surprise of flowers or a drawing. I would break up with a man on the phone. Just to not face him. I would break up with them and date someone they knew immediately. I would blow them off. Coldly. Callously. I realized I had forgotten I have done this, that I have done this. Maybe that is why shit goes down the way it does. I could only see myself be wronged. Wronged. This is an open apology to men of my past that experienced the radio silence because I was too much of a wimp to say anything even goodbye or something a self-help book would advise, I don't know. Maybe instead, instead I could come up with something that would make it all less uncomfortable. Uncomfortable it is. Truth is this awkward a.m. had more to do with me then anyone else. I can finally say it's not you, it's me and really mean it.

it’s too late to apologize and the results are in. . .

Alright I get it, I get it I pissed you off or made you sad or shared too much or too little but before I creep back to the corner and say sorry, sorry I wrote what I did, wrote what I did and put it on the internet for the world to read. I might not be on google yet, or maybe I am, but who knows what the future might hold? But people saw it, people saw it and read it and it wasn’t left for me to tell my friend(s) over the bar but I told a few hundred people. Okay I get it. I get what this is about. So all I can say is what I wrote, what I write, reflected a moment in time, might not even be how I feel right now in this very moment. It was my perspective of what happened and although it might not be your truth-it’s mine. It's mine. Let me do tell you- I edit, sparingly of course. Of course. Because it would be less interesting-Disneyfied. I didn’t tell everyone everything but I told what I had to say for myself. If others can share in my pain or joy or honesty or make fun of it-so be it. I am not going to stop. It’s too late to apologize so all I can do is keep going and say, say if only, if only I could write fiction, I would. You gave me the stories so now they are mine. Mine to share if I so choose. And dear family member who will remain nameless of course-I love you so but anything is fair game after your antics. Your quote in the paper made it possible for me to say anything. Anything at all.

now for the good stuff. . .

i am humbled beyond belief. after one month and one week of 5 days a week blogging-here are the results: hits in 6 countries (other than the good old u.s.a)-one that is just on the equator in the ocean (who are you? where you?)- some military hits (possible bf material?)- hits from half the states (both land locked and coastal and both blue and red-yes!).

800 folks have read- and a tad more than a quarter of you have came back for seconds or thirds or fourths+. please keep reading and sharing! feel free to tell me your thoughts. hope you like the addition of pics and new labels. hope you enjoyed this sunshine this past weekend if you had it where you are!

coming soon to a blog near you:

let’s play a game- what’s in your uhaul?

3 o’clock jameson

i don’t want to sit in front a computer for the rest of my life

why I-sometimes-boycott whole foods (maybe)

dirty laundry

champagne hands

i can’t sleep

swimming to angel island

i unheart the o’reilly factor

bill cosby had a point

rejection: harvard and san francisco state

sorry i forgot my tats

i must confess

assignment: 3 images from your image notebook chosen before the assignment of a confession letter was assigned. 3 images: Jelly Bellys, Pink lines across a blue sky, Mud. 10 minutes later this is what i came up with.

Dear Dad,

I must confess this, it is something I have never told anyone before or if I did I had forgotten. When I was younger, my brother, your son was pretty awfully behaved. Well to be honest, he still is. Still, he broke things. He peed on light bulbs, he flushed apples down toilets, he hit me with his plastic baseball bat, he ransacked my room. So when I broke the answering machine, I broke the answering machine. I told you that he did it. I knew because he much younger he would get away with it, but he didn’t. He got in trouble, but not too much.

I want to confess this that once when you and P went on vacation without me, I threw a huge high school party at your house, the M section house with the cream carpets. Mud tracked its way in. But I cleaned. You never found out. The cops came, but couldn’t figure out which house it was so they never found out either. I did it because you went on a family vacation when I was going away to college and I was pissed.

This one you probably already know. The time on New Year’s Eve when I had only Jelly Bellys for dinner and found refuge in the bar, I wasn’t pushed down, but I blacked out and fell on my face. Almost breaking my nose.

I must confess that sometimes I wish you were different. I wish your strength from your past would be with you today, always. I wish you weren’t depressed or sad. I wish you would tell me about my mother. I wish you would tell me about you. Without saying your stomach hurts or going to take a nap. I want you to be happy. I must confess I fear your death. I look up at the sky with pink lines against the blueness of dusk the light reflecting on my face and I think, I think about what it would be like to tell you this. How would it make me feel to speak the truth.

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.