By
Dana Rausch
/ May 22, 2014
Cedar Crest junior high camp had come to an end and it was time for the campers to clean out their cabins. As the leaders, my husband and I began the task of emptying our cabins of luggage and instructing the kids how to do so in an orderly fashion.
My girl’s cabin had a tarp on the floor that we rolled up and carried outside. We found ants on the underside and knew that we had to get a broom and brush off both sides. We returned to our cabin to gather more items when my husband walked out of his cabin and saw the tarp.
He took it and draped it over a few tables and had his boys fold all of their clothes and place in nice little piles on top of the tarp. So, when I walked out a few minutes later and saw our dirty tarp now covered in boys nice neat piles of laundry, I reacted.
“Don!” I bellowed. “That tarp has ants on it! Now all the boys clothes are going to have ants!” He walked out of the cabin bewildered. “How was I supposed to know that?” he asked.
I was furious!
I mentally went on a tirade: Why can’t he just leave things alone? Why does he do dumb things? Why can’t he just do it the way I want him to?
And I woke up from the dream…… But it took a while to wake up from the mad.
I lay in bed and thought through the scenario. It had been twenty years since being at that Junior High camp yet the dream was so real. The campers have since grown up and moved on. But I cannot say the same for my mental tirade.I contemplated how often Don will do something and I start down that same thought pattern to this day:
1. Why can’t he just leave things alone?
2. Why does he do dumb things?
3. Why can’t he just do it the way I want him to?
I fluffed my pillow, pulled up the blankets snuggly and began dissecting each question.
One, he can’t leave things alone because Don is a doer. If he sees something that needs to be done – he will just do it.
Two, he does NOT do dumb things. He simply does them different than me.
Three, hit the nail on the head. The problem lies because he doesn’t do it the way I want him to. I want to control him. It’s all about control.
I threw the covers off and ran for my laptop in the living room. I was excited because I can use this dream for a story in one of my chapters. Thank you God that you even talk to me in my dreams! Determined, I rounded the end of the bed and threw open the bedroom door.
Only to find my husband I just woke up mad at… sitting on the living room floor sipping a cup of coffee. Next to him was a wooden TV box to mount on the wall, the old TV sitting on the coffee table, a screw gun, level, pencil tucked behind his ear and he was reading a pamphlet of directions.
Why can’t he just leave things alone? Why does he….?
He looked up when I started laughing.