parenting has its privileges

your bank account is overdrawn. no money will be going into it for three days. your credit card is already at a scary level. you need bread, milk and chocolate biscuits to survive the week.

what do you do?

well, if you're a parent with a new baby, and someone has given said baby a little piggy bank, and you've been putting spare change in there occasionally, you know, so he's got the start of a savings account ......

you know where this is leading.

mike and deb owe matthew $8.50

It's the niggly little fights that just break you down. The ones that start off with a snide comment, and then that's sent back with twice the venom, and a back is turned and a voice raised and you're left sitting with your head in your hands thinking, "just - fucking - go - away".

It's not good.

Deb and I seem to be having a lot of these lately. There's reasons for it. She's at home all day with Matthew, 11 hours a day of catering to him alone. And he's getting more active, more bored with just lying there, more in need of attention and distraction. And I've got a lot on at work - it's a busy time before Christmas - added to which is my ongoing dissatisfaction with the job.

But shouldn't we be supporting each other here? Shouldn't we be talking, not yelling? Shouldn't we be partners? Well, shouldn't we?

I wonder where my head is sometimes, in the middle of these fights. Thinking of the next comment that will hurt, instead of going up to her and smiling and taking her in my arms and hugging her and stroking her hair and kissing her forehead and saying, "i love you, it will be alright".

Sometimes I think I need to break myself open completely, and give myself up again to Debbie and start anew in the ongoing dance of our marriage.