Unfiltered Story #385618

My wife and I own and run a small store, just to keep ourselves busy. it’s small enough we don’t need a lot of help: just one other full-time employee. Our previous full-timer has moved on to bigger and better things, so we hire a fresh-out-of-high-school young lady.

Our store is open from 11 to 7 on weekdays, and that’s it: we give our employee a half-hour lunch in the middle, as well as two 15-minute breaks. I come over to take register duties from her so she can go eat her lunch.

Employee: “Are you breaking me?”

Me: “I’m GIVING YOU YOUR LUNCH BREAK.”

Employee: “What’s the difference?”

Me: “If you have a few minutes after closing, my wife will tell you.”

She had a few minutes to spare after closing. Our employee’s eyes steadily grew wider as my wife explained that “breaking” someone is when one partner in a romantic relationship shrinks the other partner’s ego to the point where unless an obviously unreasonable request is being made (no telling your partner to go jump off a bridge!), the person who has been broken says “Yes, dear” and just does it without complaint. My wife further explained that the best male-female relationships are the ones where the woman breaks the man — hence the phrase “Happy wife, happy life” — and that if a man tries to break a woman he’s obviously a scumbag who’s doing it for nefarious purposes and that should be viewed as a red flag roughly the size of China. It’s a VERY different thing than giving someone a break at work!