Look into my eyes, you will see who I am...

Ya know, sometimes I feel like a whiny bitch. Wanting to tell Mrs. Duke I feel like this or I feel like that. I wonder if it seems to her that I have all of these feelings, like a woman. I wonder if I seem to be less of a man to her. I wonder if I seem fragile because I always tell her about my feelings. She makes it seem nowadays that I either am telling her a bunch of bullshit to get her reaction, or that she has heard so much about how I feel, she can't take much more or doesn't care.

I tell her how I feel. But it is not because I am feminine. There is an altogether different reason. one which I don't think Mrs. Duke knows.

When I was 19, I was married to my first wife. I worked two jobs and attended college full time. My shoe, my only pair, got a hole in the bottom. I found out one morning that my wife had opened a credit card in my name. She didn't tell me, she just forged the signature. She had this card, and had kept it from me for months. When I found out, I told her I needed new shoes. She could see that, but refused to let go get any. She said that she needed a dress and was going to spend money on that and didn't want to run up a big credit card bill.

We argued. Her side was she wanted to keep the card payment low. My side was I worked two jobs and had only one pair of shoes, and they had a hole in the bottom. Oh, and it was my fucking card!

We got into a fight and I, I still don't quite remember why, I began to choke her. I am ashamed of this. I have not told this story. But anyway I began to choke her. It was only for a second. But I had maliciously put my hands on a girl.

I got up immediately. I left the house and didn't come back all day. Not because I was mad, but because I was scared. I realized that day, I had to figure out a way to deal with anger and rage.

For the rest of our time together, I never put my hands on her in a harmful manner ever again. She did hit me. She busted my head open one time, and scratched me till I bled another time. But I never even got close to being violent with her again.

I worked out a system. One that worked for me and still does. It goes like this. Lets say that an event hurts me. Like all men, when I get hurt inside, I get pissed off. The moment it happens, I do nothing. That's right nothing. In reality, anything I could say when I am pissed and hurt is just going to be mean. So I do nothing. I work over a period of time, usually about two days, trying to get past the initial anger finding some sense in whatever happened to hurt me. That thinking gives me questions. Then when I am calm, I ask those questions. To get out the pain and anger I talk.

This is where I think Mrs. Duke may be tired of hearing how I feel all the time. I hate that. I don't know for sure what she feels about it. She doesn't talk about it. But her actions and attitude give me that vibe.

It is unfortunate if she does hate to hear about feelings. It sucks that she may think I am fragile, or feminine. But at least I don't drink, do drugs, cheat on her, or worst of all get violent.

It she is getting to where she can't deal with it anymore, I can't help that. If she is starting to have problems with me, or her image of me, then fuck it.