Duct Tape Fixes Everything
Olive oil is the duct tape of cooking
Openness is the duct tape of learning
Tradition is the duct tape of religion
Insight is the duct tape of therapy
Flexibility is the duct tape of cooperation
Fearlessness is the duct tape of skiing
Fluidity is the duct tape of ballet
Logic is the duct tape of debate
Compost is the duct tape of gardening
Style is the duct tape of writing
Timing is the duct tape of comedy
Communication is the duct tape of peace
Harmony is the duct tape of marriage
Laughter is the duct tape of friendship
Love is the duct tape of relationship
Surprise is the duct tape of humor
and You are the duct tape of me. Susan R. Grout
I got to thinking one day on how often and why for a variety of reasons, I use duct tape and this lead to the poem. What holds us together in relationships is so multifaceted. Clearly the common denominator of what holds the world together is love, all we need is love. Sound familiar?
In my long marriage I have learned some things the hard way, repeatedly making the same mistakes with overwhelming frustration and seemingly no way to resolve the situation. Example being, I'm a chronically on time person. My husband is someone who gets where he's going at the last possible second. Here is what has not worked to hurry him up: drumming my fingers, pacing, nagging, scowling, and preaching. In fact the only thing that has worked is for me to take my own car if I feel frustrated. That's the "S. Grout method". However, for 20 years he worked in another city and came home only on the weekends. Miraculously he managed to make it home having only missed the ferry a couple of times in 20 years. What was remarkable I wasn't there with my superior wisdom and finger drumming techniques to hurry him along. He did it all by himself. Hmm, I wonder if all the pacing and nagging might have been ineffective?
I'm constantly examining what does work in relationships other than love and harmony.
I find it's far easier is to list what doesn't work: selfishness, rudeness, unkindness, disinterest, disdain, contempt, criticism, childishness, intolerance, dishonesty, addictions and deceit. Of course, this is just a partial list there are numerous other road blocks to love and harmony in a relationship. So, by contrast here is the positive list: love, respect, trust, communication, cooperation, humor, maturity, kindness, curiosity, willingness, diligence, honesty and straight forwardness. Simple right?
I find that it's so easy to be calm and a pleasing, nice person when things are going well in a marriage. The positive list springs forth and all is well. Ah, but when difficulties come up, the apple cart gets upset---look out for those falling apples. This has happened, on more than one occasion in the past, when Mr. G and I were hopelessly lost in unfamiliar cities. Tension leapt out of both of us and sadly, we started to decline in age [by decades] and took to yelling and blaming each other as preteens are apt to do. "It's your fault that we are on this dead end road" "You're the one who told me to turn too late!" Ad nauseum.
Communication is the duct tape of peace
We got the chance to showcase our maturity and progress. this same situation, getting hopelessly lost, happened on a trip to see the grandchildren. We were supposed to drop our grandson off at a friend's house in the city for a party. Seemingly this was very easy-- until we missed the a quick turn off that I failed point out [I was the navigator]. We found ourselves on one of those highways with an uncrossable median and no way to recover our error for miles. Yikes. To our credit we didn't yell at each other in deference to the children in the car. Also with the miracle of cell phones we were rescued via speaker phone by the mom at home awaiting our destination with instructions for an alternate route. She was incredibly understanding about our error and very gracious and helpful to us. We looked at each other, after we dropped off the grandson and were much chagrined. There and then we vowed next time to study the map prior to take off for parts unknown. The good news is we were civil to each other, the better news is many years ago this would have been a yell fest and we have matured! About time.
Insight is the duct tape of therapy
My own insights in the past have been rather short lived, I clearly hope that my clients fare better. Though I still tend to make the same mistakes over and over again [did I point out that I am rather impatient?] the agony time is shorter and shorter as I age. "Oops", I say internally and quickly go about rectifying the situation and set about to have a good time, a primary goal in my life.
Flexibility is the duct tape of cooperation
After we finally found our destination for our grandson, our son had urged us to take our granddaughter to a park to play. That way we could wait until we had to pick up our grandson after the party. Well and good. However, have any of you tried to find a parking place on a sunny Sunday near a children's park in a big city? What fun! Sometimes you can get lucky but clearly this was not our day for that and we drove from one car jammed street to the next trying to find one tiny space for our rental car. Finally after 15 minutes of this fruitless endeavor we looked at each other and said, "how about the beach?" Our granddaughter wasn't thrilled but a very good sport especially after we bought her a chocolate croissant and 'Annie's Cheddar Bunnies' [both!] down by the shore. We ended up having a very pleasant afternoon and the final bribe of hot chocolate clinched the deal. A very fine afternoon indeed. Roll with the punches my friend. Not only does duct tape fix everything but also bribery and treats do as well.
:
Timing is the duct tape of comedyLaughter is the duct tape of friendship
No comments:
Post a Comment