“You Wouldn't Like Me When I'm Angry.”

I apparently am a scary guy.  I say this because some people I know flee in fear when I am mildly annoyed.  My version of mildly annoyed apparently is at the edge of murderously enraged for some people.  The scary thing, the truly scary thing, is that most people have never seen me truly angry.  I scare myself when I am truly angry.

When I am truly angry, it is such a powerful thing that my grip on my conduct and my sanity is tenuous.  It goes back, as many things do, to my alcoholic upbringing.  The relationship of my parents was, as we called it in sociology class, conflict habituated.  They loved each other.  And they loved to argue almost as much as they loved each other.

Therefore I grew up prizing harmony.  And thus I overvalue it and therefore tend to be willing to take more than I should to avoid conflict.  So when conflict is inevitable, I cut loose with a force more appropriate to everything that I have gone along with instead of just the matter at hand.

I am working on expressing my truly feelings immediately, rather than stifling them until they boil over.  But when you're "always" amenable, people find you actually speaking your mind an unwelcome and disquieting jolt.  But no matter the effect on my life, I am sure it's better than my being angry.  You wouldn't like me when I'm angry.