How are you today?

[SrChulo]

Do you think you could unravel that a little for me, Sr? Through PA I have met lots of lovely Spanish people and they have all been very accepting. I mean, same sex couples can get married in Spain, which is a bit of a rarity in the US!

Sure. A little backstory. We like to talk about the differences between American and Spanish cultures. For example, I have always pointed out how brutally honest Spaniards can be. The other day we were talking about a friend of mine, and his comment was something like "Yea, he's very handsome in the face, but his body is terrible." Or something. I really don't like comments like that, I think they're rude and reflect poorly on whoever's saying them.

His response is that at least Spaniards are honest, and say what they feel instead of the American way of lying to someone's face and talking badly about them later. I think both scenarios are huge generalizations, even mine. But it is one thing I've noticed after living here for a while. People have seen Sex in the City or have been to Manhattan once, and they think they know Americans.

So last night, I was dressed and ready to leave. As I'd leave he'd stop me every time. He didn't want me to leave mad. You might think that sounds sweet, but it's just because he didn't want to feel like he did something wrong. "But don't be mad... but don't be mad...." So one way he tried to remedy the situation was by saying that there was a simple cultural misunderstanding. (This didn't even last long as he realized that it wasn't working). But anyway, he claimed that when he asked me "What do you want to do, stay or leave?" That he was simply asking a question and it was not loaded whatsoever. I dismissed this, because it's just not the truth. In fact, he had JUST been explaining to me how he "thought it would be nice to hang out for a little while... i have so much fun with you... bla bla bla" So, he intention was clearly to have me go home.

Let me say that I am not a drama queen, and I never get angry like this. This might be... the second time in over a year that I've actually gotten angry in front of him. He had realized that he had screwed the pooch on this one, but for almost the entire conversation, his intention was not to fix it or apologize, but just to make sure that he could go to sleep with a clean conscience. He used his classic tactics:

• Denial
  
• Bringing up irrelevant issues: "There are times when you don't want to sleep here because of x, y, z"
  
• Fake apology: "it was not my intention to get you mad" (i hate this one)
  
• Flipping it around "But you don't even want to sleep here...."
  
• Flipping it around x2, x3, x4 "You just want to come out to andres [roommate] because you know it annoys me" completely blasphemous. How can anyone be so self centered?!?!?!?
  
• Giving me the chance to give in: "Just sleep here tonight! and it's over! no problem"
  
• x2: "Don't u want to be with me??"
  
• Angry self pity "I can't do anything right"
  

Everything inbetween those tactics was "give me a kiss... give me a kiss...."

As I left, he called me. He started with the "it was not my intention to get you mad." I told him "Obviously it was not your intention to get me mad. Why would anyone intentionally try to make someone else mad???? Let's continue this tomorrow because we may both be saying things we don't mean."

And that's when he said "I'm sorry....... please forgive me."

I said "thank you for the apology, that sounds much better." and we left it like that. This morning I got another "i'm sorry" from him.