I’m Living the Evolution Chart

Posted on August 7, 2013 by enthusiasmiscontagious

I envision getting older like the evolutionary chart of man. I know you’ve seen the black sequential silhouette. You start as a young monkey bent over, and as you get older your posture improves only to revert back to the slumping monkey at the end. I won’t tell you where on the chart I feel at this moment, but bananas do qualify as soft food right?

Reaching and surpassing the age of fifty is as disheartening as trying to impress a beautiful girl with a Chevy Nova with tattered seats. Who am I kidding? The best part of getting to my age is you no longer care about the peer pressure. Who cares if my car looks like it took a direct hit from a roadside bomb in Fallujah. It’s got heat, air conditioning, and it’s reliable. When the smoke from the tail pipe resembles a mushroom cloud as I get out, I simply tell people my second job is bee keeping. They seem to understand with an approving nod.

Funny about driving a rent-a-wreck, I tend to drive alone. My kids always slump down in the seats in case one of their friends see them in my goober mobile. I’ve decided to keep it because it offers me some financial benefits! Now when we visit, they unanimously offer to take us everywhere in their vehicles and we spend their gas.

I love reaching the age where my years of parental coaching is beginning to pay off. I have been to each of my children’s new homes and before I can even leave the room, they yell at me to switch the light off. Imagine all the years of my training them has finally prompted them to take shorter showers, leave all the lights off, while setting the thermostat beyond anyone’s comfort level. Who would have guessed?

The other night while visiting our son, he promised us dinner out. “It’s the least I can do”, he emphasized. We were impressed with his new found independence and riches. I’m glad we didn’t get over dressed; the Taco Bell was unusually crowded.

I do find it funny that my children have become more thrifty than they ever allowed me to be. When they were teens, everything I purchased seemed never to meet their expectations. Now I visit my youngest son’s new apartment, he doesn’t have two glasses that match, the curtains look like they came from a feed store, and the toilet paper feels like rice paper with sand woven into the fibers.

Christmas will be easy this year for him. All I need to buy is a jumbo package of Charmin, some fall-out shelter drapes, and a stack of paper cups from the hotel chain I always stay. I know it will have the name on them, but at least he’ll have a matching set.

He can’t be too upset with my generosity. It’s only a matter of time before the evolution chart has me dragging my knuckles back in the dirt and they’ll be saying I’ve gone bananas. Maybe the evolution chart may have some degree of realism after all.

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Marriage Enrichment 101

Posted on August 1, 2013 by enthusiasmiscontagious

I have just returned from a three day seminar on marriage enrichment. Marriage is like food. Everyone eats, therefore they feel like an expert in the field of food. The same can be said for marriage. Just because you’ve been married umpteen years, doesn’t mean you should write a book on how to do marriage.

A husband sat in the living room reading his newspaper one day when his wife of 25 years came in the front door depressed. With a woeful sigh she exclaimed, “You won’t believe the day I’ve had!” This exasperated the husband. He stated emphatically, “Honey, Ive listened to your negativity constantly all these years. There’s a new rule in this house. Unless it’s positive from now on, you can’t say anything at all.” She paused for a moment and breaking into a smile she said, “Then you’ll be happy to know the airbags work!”

In order to foster reflection and intimacy at our recent meetings, the presenters asked us during our evening break, to take our spouse by the hand and find a symbol in nature that best reflects your marriage. Some brought back intertwined vines, others flowers. For our symbol, I brought back two dead love bugs.

When people ask me how many years we’ve been married, I tell them 29 years. But I add, it’s 32 if you count the windchill. When they have that puzzled look on their face I add, “There were a few cold years in between.”

It was after our noon lunch break at the seminar when we had a moment to ourselves. My wife turns to me and says, “So, do you want to walk or.” And before she finished I said, “I choose or!” She laughed. This is the kind of marriage we have. We laugh a lot and we talk a lot. I don’t profess to know all the answers to the perfect marriage, but when these two elements are present, and you ask God to be a present member of your family, your marriage can make it.

And finally when it comes to how her husband looks, my wife attests that the perfect husband is only a light switch away. This might explain why our electric bill was the lowest it’s ever been this past month.

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Children-Masters of Mayhem

Posted on July 27, 2013 by enthusiasmiscontagious

A popular post from August 2012.

My children have a game that absolutely drives me nuts. They choose the most obnoxious classmate they have gone to school with and they call each other that name over and over. In the past umpteen years, my daughter has been called Sammy by her brothers. My sons have been called Crystal and Pickle (no, I’m not kidding) by their sister. The game usually culminates in total anarchy just as we’re about to share a quiet dinner or leave to go on a trip. I’m beginning to understand why some insect species eat their young.

Last year, I finally had enough. I bought the biggest conversion van on the market. It was a 7.5 liter 460 engine behemoth that passed anything but a gas station. Why did I buy it? Because when we drove a car, the children fought over the window and who sat in the middle. They couldn’t see, couldn’t hear the radio, someone was sleeping on them, they were too hot, too cold, too cramped, or get this, someone was sitting on their imaginary line.

Now I drive a van that’s built like an ark, has more windows than an inner-city aquarium, more seating capacity than a high school football stadium, dual heat and air conditioning, a television, a king size bed, and you know what? They still fight! My only consolation is they are ten yards away instead of one and when I turn the radio up high, they are somewhat muffled.

I’ve discovered something very important as a parent of three “blessed” children. Don’t call your parents for sympathy. When I was sharing with them on the phone how much my kids argued and fought, I heard nothing but hysterical laughter. I did get a postcard a week later with the words, “We have been vindicated,” on it. I have to assume it was from them.

I wonder if there is an end in sight? Will the time ever come when my three children will take a ride, eat a meal, or play together when I won’t hear arguing? Oddly enough, I have the answer to this question. It’s in the sale of recreational vehicles. They are selling like hotcakes. It’s due to the fact that 90 percent of all RVers are running away from their kids. When I drive more than 200 miles with my children in tow, I arrive at my destination so frazzled my knuckles must be pried from the wheel by the Jaws of Life and my hair looks like a bomb went off! Yet every RVer I see driving down the road seems relaxed, composed, and most are grinning ear to ear.

I have decided that when my last child hits 18, my wife and I are joining the witness protection program and buying an RV. We’re only coming home if our grandchildren are just like their parents. We’re not going to miss our chance at vindication either.

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I’ve Got A Secret

Posted on July 24, 2013 by enthusiasmiscontagious

Do you have the irresistible urge to know a secret? Maybe the secret is better left unsaid. I learned the hard way some years ago that I really don’t want to know everything.

We had been making weekly visits to our friends who had four young children. The next to youngest child had a penchant for playing with combs, brushes, and make-up. She wanted to be a beautician. This beautiful little girl no more than six, was always playing beauty shop with friends and family friends. I was her next target on our next visit.

The bathroom of this small house opened up to the dining room. If the door was open, everyone could see you and vice versa. So upon leaving the tiny rest room, the little girl grabbed me by the hand and said, “Come back and sit on the side of the tub, and I’ll comb your hair for you.” She was most animated and insistent. The family encouraged me to do her bidding as it would make her happy.”

I sat down and she picked up what I thought was a diminutive little brush. The family smiled and watched as their daughter made swirls of my hair and would then make a mess of it only to start all over again.

Maybe you’re like me, you hate people laughing at you. But since it made this little girl’s evening, I dismissed their occasional pointing and smirking and encouraged her to continue. I was proud that she was comfortable enough to ask me if she could “play” with my hair, or whatever was left of it.

Our evening ended as it always had done. Hugs to everyone, and we happily drove our sixty-minute drive home. That episode of hair combing was never repeated and I found out why four years later.

The mother of these “blessed children” never had the courage to tell me the rest of the story. Now revisiting them after we had moved away, she confided there was a huge reason for their earlier laughing and pointing.

She said they were horrified when their daughter had mistakenly taken their new smaller toilet brush and began using it as the main prop for her beautician encounter with me. She told us while we were oblivious to it, she and her husband were aghast. Following our visit, they promised each other never to tell us the truth, the whole truth, or nothing of the truth.

Now that we had moved away, she felt safer to tell us with a little glee, the rest of the story. Now four years removed from that night, I think back on the episode with a little shudder. I used my pillow case every night for another week. Was the unexplained pollen I thought I found in my hair actually flicks of toilet tissue?

Maybe the greatest lesson learned from this incident is, I may have found a reason why many of my friends say at times I appear a little flush?

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