Vertebrae

When my wife and I first met, and we were dating, it became very clear, early on, that we handled conflict differently. What would pique my interest and get me excited for a hard conversation would get her blood pressure up and have her running for the hills. I would want to engage, she would want to escape. I would want to investigate, she would want to ignore at all costs.    After meeting her family, I recognized that we had very different upbringings. My father was famous for stopping a conversation in the middle of dinner to pull me aside and correct what I had just done or said inappropriately. It was awkward for 5 minutes, but it addressed the issue and we moved forward not carrying anything with us.    Elyse was more comfortable with skirting the conversation, trying to brush it under the rug and get out of the dinner unscathed. That’s what she would consider “success.”    She was a peace-keeper (just wanting to keep the peace) and I was a peace-maker, (just wanting to do anything in my power to fix i