Well, let's assume for a second that there is a dog. A person throws a stick. The dog goes to the stick but doesn't pick it up. Instead, he goes back to the person. The dog gets a fist to the muzzle. The dog then goes and gets the stick. The person then beats him with said stick. Both ways this dog has learned that he will be beat, but one is with a stick and the other is with a hand. He will choose which pain is easier to deal with and continue to be beaten by that preferred method. As well as that, he will ultimately not want to play fetch...
I didn't finish the dishes last night. Big deal, I've got 3 days off and today is the first of those 3 days. I decided (after I forgot (caught up with getting my investment out of a video game, I'll confess.)) I intended to wash them as well as straiten out my study in my apartment. So I left the stick in the field... I'll get it later. 9:00 rolls around. My wife calls me and tells me that I've been snapping at her as of late. I see it the other way around. Her mother was visiting and for some reason her mother has a sway over my wife's emotions, that and I think my wife is a biker. By that I mean she got on her menstrual cycle and ran me over... At any rate, she asks me to do the dishes, sort the laundry, hide the dirty draws and make rice for a dinner I wouldn't eat; she had to sweep an clear the table, make shake and bake (and I was too busy to help).
A day before, I was bathing my kid when my kid defecated in the water. I have a queasy stomach and told her about it. She told me to move like I was 7. I jokingly mentioned that it was her turn and she revved up the motor on her red kawa-sock-me and let me have it.
"Oh, I don't think so. I've had to wash the last two. And the last one you did was only half done. I still had to wipe the crap out of the bath."
Queasy stomach!!! I would rather clean a dirty tub with crap in it versus a dirty tub with puke and crap in it. I'm just sorry that I couldn't do anything about that. I'm powerless against the torrent of gastric fury.
Any way. When I did the dishes the first time, I got the "thank you but..." line. Anyone who understands the word but will tell you that "But" really means forget what you just said. So, I got the schpiel about how one should rinse dishes with hot water, wipe them off, use soap. Like I was 7. Not much has changed in a year except that now she rides her hound-a with a muffler. She keeps her negative comments to herself and justs lets me know I don't do it as well as she does. She finds one thing to criticize every time I do anything around the house, and thus beats me with the stick I fetched.
I keep my house clean to taste. My wife's taste is more refined. If her mom comes over, she has to prove to her mother that she is better off and thus sets me to work... Throws the stick out and tells me to fetch. I could care less about proving that I have it all together to her mother. I know I don't; I revel in it. I live in a permanent state of brokenness and disarray. Further pandering to that kind of manipulation only reinforces the manipulative behavior and thus history repeats (fractally.) But if I bring it up she gets flustered because I've just compared her to her mother.
I don't do housework, I get a slap to the face. I do do house work, I get hit by criticism. I really don't want to play this game any more. There is only so many times a dog gets beat before he thinks to stop playing catch. There are only so many times that a dog will salivate at a bell before it starves.
