First Fight

I HATE fighting with my boyfriend. I don't mean Reuben in particular, I just mean getting into fights with any boyfriend, in general. But, we all know they are inevitable...and Reuben and I had a conversation pretty early on when we started dating, acknowledging the fact that, at some point, we were going to argue.

At that point, I had to fill Reuben in about the stress and anxiety that fighting causes me - my ex didn't know how to have a fight without breaking up with me. Now... prior to that emotional cluster-f*ck of a situation, I had always felt that some arguing and fighting was healthy for a relationship. My parents who have a 30+ year marriage have worked through many issues in their decades-long time together - some pretty serious. But when you are with someone who doesn't get the concept of working through things - it can make one (understandably) squeamish about raising conflict.

Reuben promised me, in that moment, that unless some person or animal was purposefully maimed - he would not break up with me over our first fight. Haha.

Fast-forward to last Friday night - one of Reuben's quirks is that he is absolutely the most timely person anyone will ever meet. He thinks being on time is a sign of respect for yourself and for the people you are meeting. (I agree, I am just not as fastidious about it). We were supposed to meet some friends of his for drinks at 9:30 - drinks - which in my mind means, "casual meet-up at approximately that time."

I ended up getting stuck at work really late (not entirely my fault) and we still had to get dinner before we met up with his friends - he was dilly-dallying too by finishing one last round of some MMORPG (or whatever the video game nerds are playing these days) and suggested we go early and eat bar food because he would rather be early and eat nasty-sh*t then be late and feed his girlfriend properly (<-- case="" exposition="" in="" it="" last="" obvious="" p="" part="" pure="" t="" that="" was="" wasn="">
It was around 8:45 by the time we stopped at a sushi place - we figured sushi would be quick. I kept telling him that it wasn't a big deal if we were a little late, that it was just drinks. We were also right around the corner from the bar so I told him to tell his friends to come meet us - we could share a bottle of sake and then all walk back over to the bar together... I was trying to find a creative solution.

But he was just getting annoyed that I didn't think it was a big deal to be late - and then dinner wasn't fast enough - and then his friends were texting him all though dinner giving him crap about being late - and I was annoyed he was on his phone all through dinner - and then... right as were done with our meal - HE ORDERED ANOTHER BOTTLE OF SAKE!! WHAT!?!?!

So after all his whining about me making us late and then not caring about it - he made us later - and you know what he said...and I quote, "In for a penny, in for a pound." Ugh, I wanted to hit him. Not really. 

We finally got to the bar at 10, which, while it is pretty late, isn't terrible considering he was texting his friends all through dinner anyway - but it really sucked to have to keep hanging out all night. I honestly just wanted to go home. But after two more drinks I was drunk enough to forget that there was tension between us and ended up having a pretty good night, but we definitely had to talk about it the next day.

I ended up apologizing for not respecting the plans that he had made (in retrospect, I should have just sucked it up and eaten sh*tty bar food). And he apologized for blaming me for making us late - when it was defititely a team effort.

True to form, he did not break up with me over our first fight. (yay!) Granted it was a VERY minor fight but I am glad to have it out of the way - and have more insight into how we deal with conflict and resolution.

Ah ... back to relationship bliss. (for now).