You only get what you give

Bert and Rania Ghani at 24 Hour Fitness

For some time now, it has been on my mind to not only be more productive, but to make a mark on those I come in contact with. Yea, I know what you're thinking. You think I want to put a knot on the head of all those people who need to go back to driving school, right? Yes and no. Just yesterday if seemed like every looney with a car was on the road and my bride and I had made an emergency trip to the gym to pick up cake Rania Ghani had left for us in the refrigerator and we forgot about it.

We hopped in my Jeep and made the three mile drive over and back and I swear we witnessed at least ten acts of aggravated ignorant driving - but that's not what I want to discuss with you today. As much satisfaction as I get from bumping my gums and pounding the steering wheel of my 4X4, it's time to make some corrections. Seriously with all that hot air, all I'm doing is amping up my blood pressure.

I asked this question to 20 of my BFF's (best friends forever) and this is their reply. It is a list that you can print and then challenge yourself to accomplish.

1. Write in cursive so that I don't lose that skill. 2. Don't forget to look at things with childlike wonder. See shapes in the clouds. 3. I should read the bible daily so that I can continue to grow in God's word. Strive to live a life that is pleasing to God. 4. Adopt the Boy Scout philosophy of doing a good deed everyday. 5. Do the crossword puzzle in the paper, read more books and help with the housework. 6. Hold hands with your sweetie or your grandchild every day, or give out hugs to those you genuinely care for. Physical touch keeps you connected to humanity.

7. Daily prayer/meditation time. It keeps you connected to the Creator, and closer to His vision and purpose for your life. 8. Learn something new everyday, a new recipe, or a word. 9. Prepare for "Zombies". Take Self Defense classes. Hone a skill like carpentry. Build bird houses or lawn furniture. Learn to weld. Build metal yard art, lawn furniture. 10 Never look down on anyone, unless you are stopping to help them up. 11. Audit a class, take up art or photography, learn a foreign language.

12. Learn to play an instrument. 13. Random acts of kindness to total strangers. Give give and give. 14. Master writing with your non-dominant hand. Does interesting things to your brain. 15. Pick one thing no matter how small to be grateful for. Be grateful for the little things. They are often the most important. 16. talk to a minimum of 5 people a day, no matter what happens. Old people, young people, neighbors, hot girls at the gym. Engage everyone. Welcome them into your life via conversation with zero expectation of where it goes. Be authentic in your exchange. welcome the good.

17. Keep your list of items posted where you can see it and try to complete your list. 18. Thank a Veteran by picking up their tab if you see them in a restaurant or coffee shop. Get to know your neighbors. Donate an hour to read to children at your local library during storybook time. 19. Think in terms less about yourself...And more of others. 20. Pick up the police officer's lunch tab.

I look at this list of suggestions and nowhere do I see anyone suggesting that we get angry over the way someone violates the rules of the road.  Rats!  I guess I will have to change my evil ways. This week I was closing my spin class at the NASA location and I challenged the class to do an unselfish act of kindness over the next week and I saw it on their faces that a little reminder to do good is a salve for the soul. Sure we all know to do good, but sometimes our fellow citizens do not invoke that response in us. That's why we need lists like the one above and gentle reminders that you only get what you give. What goes around, surely comes around and like the Beatles said; "And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make".

Now that we have a plan, what say we put it into action?

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The honeymoon is probably over

If you have been married for any real length of time, you have learned to live harmoniously for the most part, right? If you haven’t then, stop reading right now, as you have a lot to learn about long term relationships and this will not help you with that.

As a certified spouse, I probably would describe myself as handsome, fairly predictable, and not all that hard to live with and would get “that look” from my bride, especially if I rendered this buffoonish (baboonish?) depiction of myself in her favorite company, namely her BFF’s, known as her Yah yah’s.

They are a close knit group and once a quarter they meet for inspirational devotions and fellowship and to pray for their spouses and friends – her words, not mine.  I suspect their friends get a free pass (read Indulgences) and their mates the real scrutiny (again, I am simply speculating here).

I call it a surfeiting food fest with copious amounts of profoundly righteous gossip, but that I guess is open for interpretation (read downright objection). I reckon they tell their Yah yah’s everything about their husbands that needs correcting and after an intoxicating amount of fattening foods and homemade sweets; they get down to the serious business of interceding for their hell-bound spouse’s aberrant souls, especially me most likely. Now here’s the coup de grâce, they then exchange gifts, consisting of interesting junk none of them would personally buy. Like the kings visiting the baby Jesus, I presume, but I may be off on that aspect, like all my other observations of the married fairer sex.

Now I must assert that I have hundreds of good points, but usually am in the dog house over something and that may have happened three days ago or longer. Who knows? I surely don’t and that’s the truth. I generate fodder for the quarterly Sabbatical like a spewing wood chipper at the hands of the people who trim trees for the power company. The truth is it is because I am a man. There. I said it. Those of us that enter into a contract of blissful holy matrimony are doomed from that unspecified time following the honeymoon until death do us part or the wife finally has had enough and kicks us to the curb.

Thank the good Lord we may possibly be redeemed by our devote Yah yah’s through much caloric intersession and well-meaning scrutiny and exhaustive confession.

The intricate female brain’s upward spiral in matrimony starts shortly after the honeymoon with her barren wardrobe and it will never get truly stocked. The honey-do list is four leagues long and after each laborious task is checked off, two more are penciled in after it. This is not only one of the hidden and sacrosanct statutes buried in the sacred vows, but a heinous conundrum that after nearly 40 years of marriage, still perplexes me. Why is it women feel compelled to make lists of things for their husband to accomplish, but the husband never has a single item on their list for the wife? Not a single one.

The bathing area, tub, shower, and cabinets have forty-seven thousand little bottles of various solutions and scents and I have a bar of soap, a single container of shampoo and what us Southern boys call a warshrag. I can deal with it until my tiny space get buried by all that stuff she simply has to have! I was informed one day after making a mild and meek suggestion that there may just be a possibility that there could be a little bit too much there. “I am a woman and I need that stuff and besides, most of it was given to me by my Yah-yah’s and you wouldn’t understand!”

Blam! She threw down the Yah-yah trump card, which incidentally weighs close to an Armenian metric ton in reasoning and finality. Like I’ve said, I’ve been married long enough to know when to yell calf-rope and I backed away with both hands held high, but this brings us to the gist of this column. I also know (believe) when to draw the line and I’ll explain.

I always have insisted that I have a green toothbrush and she was free to explore the many colors of other teeth-cleaning color combinations, but what do I find when I open the drawer?  Two green toothbrushes and the second one is hers!  Blasphemy and by golly I threw up the red flag (not literally mind you).

I marched right into the living room and demanded an explanation.  I mean this is an open travesty of a written in stone rule that has been in place for almost 4 decades.  “Oh, I got that free at Doctor Platt’s office the other day, mine is in the other drawer.  Rats, out-foxed again. Oh Lord, is there still hope for us married men?