One strong pet peeve of mine is when people chew loudly/with their mouths open. Whether it be at the dinner table, at a restaurant, or just sitting around. Something about it gets on my nerves. It seems that the people closest to me are the ones that affect me so much. Sitting there trying to eat my dinner while I listen to “CHOMP CHOMP CHOMP.”

I have been taught as a kid, “Chew with your mouth closed” and other manners at the dinner table such as keep your phone off of the table, and keep your knees below the table. So, my siblings and I would purposefully do this to annoy each other. This had annoyed me because of the fact that we had been told not to do that and it was against the most basic table manners. As a kid, I would not think to peacefully solve this problem. I usually thought my siblings were trying to annoy me by doing this, so we got into many fights. Now, whenever I encounter someone doing this trivial act, I think to myself  They are not trying to annoy me, they don’t know that it’s a pet peeve of mine. With the closer people in my life, I have brought it up in an attempt to solve the problem. This seems to urge them to do it more and try and get me annoyed. Knowing this, I just keep it to myself.

As it continues to occur in my life, I find my own ways of solving the problem. Trying to change my perspective or think of how meaningless it really is. I still get carried away, sitting at the dinner table. I sit there listening to their mouths go on and on as loud as a train horn in my head. But, they don’t think there is anything wrong.

While everyone has their own pet peeves this is mine. I continue to find more ways to fix this and change my thoughts but it seems the more I try, the more it gets in my head and annoys me. Although it annoys me in the moment, it’s not enough to take time away from the people I was with.