Communication

Do you ever just wish you could have back the time you wasted being mad about something that did not deserve any of your time, energy or anxiety?

Today I was mad at my dear husband because our 22 year old son, home from college and heading to his job, told me that hubby had plans for the afternoon/evening. I don't really like to hear about schedules through the kids and we had been working on clear communicating of the schedule as the hectic summer begins. SOOOO I was mad, then when I asked for an explanation, ready for a fuss, it turned out to not really true. Actually not accurate message delivery at all.

I should not be surprised. Didn't lots of us play 'Chinese telephone' as kids? I suppose it is not ethically sensitive now to call that game by its original name, but maybe you remember how it worked. Stand in a circle, one kid whispers a message to another all the way around. At the end of the circle the message was NEVER (that I remember) the same as it began. We laughed and laughed and tried again.

Well I laughed today at the inaccurate message delivery at my house, but it did make me wonder. How many stories do I hear that really are not quite right, quite true, quite off the mark? I want to ask questions, do some checking, laugh at the errors while NOT wasting time being upset. Digging deeper for the true message might take a bit longer, but it is sure worth the wait.