I read an article the other day commenting that people should stop saying they hate math or they’re bad at math because that way of thinking discourages young people, causing them to fear numbers. Instead, we should say we struggle with math but we’re always getting better.

My struggle with numbers is like the Geico lizard wrestling Godzilla.

I’ll say it up front – I hate math, I’m bad at math and I’m terrified of math.

It’s easy to figure out why my career path involves letters and words instead of numbers and equations. Writing an essay for school was never difficult, the paragraphs and words coming easily.

Not so with algebra, geometry and math.

For years, I blamed my teachers in high school. My geometry teacher, Mr. Deere, was absolutely awful. He showed up for class after the bell rang, gave our papers back late and spent most of his time sitting at his desk, looking at motorcycle magazines.

My algebra teacher was our head varsity basketball coach. It was like catching fish in a barrel to divert his attention away from equations and over to the game of the week. I remember writing notes to my best friend or reading a book while he dissected plays on the blackboard, the athletes in the room arguing maneuvers and strategy day after day.

In college, I only had to take one math class, and the teacher was rigid and strict. I wish I could remember his name because his ethics about teaching shaped my philosophy about how to be a good employee. He told us he would not miss a day of class because we’d paid for this class, and it was his obligation to be there. Not only was he in class every day, but he was a thorough teacher.

That class was the first time I felt comfortable with math, and I actually made good grades in that class. More than that, I understood the formulas and procedures because he made sure we got it. I left there feeling confident.

After that, I worked as a secretary, and math wasn’t a big part of my job, so that confidence slowly faded away. But my lack of math skills cost me money. I relied on “experts” at the bank and the credit union to keep track of my money and accounts. I couldn’t do my taxes, so I paid someone to do them for me, even though they were pretty simple.

One year, I got a letter from the Internal Revenue Service stating I owed them $500. I panicked and sent the check right in, never questioning their decision. Years later, I got another letter from them, stating I owed even more money.

By that time, I was married, and my math genius husband stepped in. He re-calculated my taxes from that year and deduced I didn’t owe the money. Instead, the IRS owed me a refund plus interest.

He explained the entire process – I pretended I followed the numbers – and said I should sign a letter to the IRS he’d written, demanding interest and my money back.

All I could see was myself behind bars, but I had faith in my husband, signed the document and sent it in.

A few weeks later, I got a check from the IRS and an apology for their mistake.

Math to the rescue.

Being married to someone who calculates numbers in their head as easily as I can sing “Happy Birthday” has been a blessing. It’s also a crutch because I pass over anything having to do with numbers to my hubby.

And my trusty phone that’s absolutely amazing at remembering dates, figuring out percentages when I’m shopping the sales, keeping track of my car’s mileage, timing how long I need to bake chicken, reminding me of important dates and keeping a working list of every phone number I’ll ever need.

Numbers to the rescue.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald. 

            Spring is here. In Texas, spring usually lasts about two weeks and then we dive straight into summer for the next seven months. But it’s technically spring and one of the rituals of spring, besides driving around looking for wildflowers, includes spring cleaning. Growing up in the North, our spring cleaning meant airing out the house after months of the house being bundled up against the snow and sub-zero temperatures. Windows were included in the spring cleaning ritual as were putting away heavy coats, scarves and gloves until cold weather returned. 

            My mom tackled the chore with a vengeance. She’d vacuum the rugs and carpets and fill the clothes line in the back yard with freshly washed curtains, drapes and blankets.

            So whenever I hear “spring cleaning,” the old tapes start playing in my head, and I start making a list of things to clean. I looked online for some tips, and good ole’ Martha Stewart graciously provided a printable spring cleaning list.

            Immediately, I can scratch at least half of her items off my list. We don’t have window screens, nor do we have storm windows. She also recommends waxing wooden furniture with paste wax. Sorry, Martha, but spray-on Pledge has worked just fine for 40 years.

            She does mention dusting the ceiling fan blades. Since ours seldom stop spinning and they’re so high up, it’s hard to see if there’s dust on there. However, that could be an item I’ll add to the list. I’ll get to that task right after I find the ladder.

            Which brings me to Martha’s recommendation for cleaning out the garage. My husband is extremely organized and neat, so there’s no need to add that to my spring cleaning list. And since the garage is so neat, I’d hate to mess it up by dragging the ladder out.

            So I suppose the ceiling fan blades can wait.

            Vacuum and shampoo rugs are next on the list. I’ll vacuum but our carpet isn’t that old, so I’ll defer that chore for another five years.

            Martha also recommends washing comforters and drapes. We don’t really have harsh winters so there aren’t heavy blankets to wash and hang out on the line. Besides, we don’t have a clothes line and I don’t have a clue where to buy clothes pins other than an arts and crafts store. So I quickly scratch those off the list.

            As far as washing curtains, I have the perfect excuse – we don’t have any. Thanks to allergies, I took down all the curtains years ago. Faux wood blinds do quite nicely, but I have a feeling there’s a nice layer of dust on all of them.    

            I took a closer look and, yep, there’s a layer of dust on every single blind. But if I start cleaning those, I’m only going to stir up a lot of dust and that’ll send my allergies into overdrive. Maybe it’s best if I just leave that dust there as a sort of protective sealant.

            Same goes for dust on the furniture. That fine layer of dust protects the wood, or so I’ve convinced myself, so I’ll just overlook that particular spring cleaning job.

            Scanning Martha’s list, I find I can cross a lot of things off without a second thought – clean the refrigerator coils – I don’t even know where those are – and defrost the freezer. Once the words “no-frost” came into my vocabulary, I’ve never looked back.

            The chores I will put on the list are updating the first-aid kit and tucking the warm-weather clothes out of the way. As a Texan, that’s about three items of clothing in my closet. Easiest job on the list.

            So there’s my spring cleaning list. Now I think I’ll get out there and enjoy those milder temperatures before the 98-degree days arrive. That should be in about a week.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

 

             

            “Fly the friendly skies” may be the most ironic slogan in the airline industry these days. Two major disruptions happened on United Airlines flights recently. In the first, Dr. David Dao was dragged off an airplane after he refused to give up his seat so crew members could board.

A couple, on their way to their wedding, were told to get off an airplane because they were in seats other than the ones they reserved and supposedly refused to go back to their purchased seats.

             In both instances, the circumstances become a “he-said-she-said” fiasco where one claims the other was belligerent, obstinate and caused a disruption.

            We learned quite a few lessons from these two incidents. First, nobody at United Airlines seems to have paid attention in the “Customer Relations 101” course. Secondly, they let incidents get out of control and then made wrong decisions to rectify the fiascos.

            Maybe the folks at United Airlines need to talk to kindergarten teachers about class management because the parties involved exhibited behavior similar to 5-year-old children.

             A typical kindergarten scenario: Child A sits in the blue seat where Child B had been sitting until he got up to get a drink of water.

            Child B returns and begins to whine that someone is sitting in their blue seat. Child A stays in the seat and ignores the whining until the child starts tugging on the chair.

             At that point, a war has started, and the referee – the teacher – has to decide who’s right – the blue seat was technically Child B’s or Child A took advantage of a situation.

               In the adult world, we’d call Child A an opportunist.

                We’d call Child B out of luck. For grown-ups, possession is 9/10ths of the law.

                     But we’re talking kindergarten, a place children go to learn and conflicts are handled a little more delicately.

                     The teacher might ask both children to state why they think the chair belongs to them. Then she might suggest they take turns in the chair, and both children would immediately start whining that the chair belonged to them.

                       The teacher might then try distraction to see if she could get one of the children to lose interest in the chair by offering up a different prize. That could be the empty dress-up play center or to be the special helper, a title always tempting to a 5-year-old.

                          If those tactics don’t work, then the teacher might say neither child is sitting in the seat which gives her two crying children instead of one. Ultimately, she makes a deal where both children might not get exactly what they wanted but they walk away happy.   

                      Back to United Airlines. They lost track of the kindergarten rules. Unhappy children make for an unhappy class. Unhappy passengers make for an unpleasant flight and instant notoriety on social media.

                    Biggest mistake — United didn’t offer a big enough incentive for the passengers to either leave the plane or move to another seat.

                 People on airplanes want to get to their destination. They want to sit in the blue chair. But when something shinier, the dress-up play center or $500 cash, is offered, most people will take the prize and everybody walks away satisfied if not entirely happy.

                    I was on a Southwest Airlines flight when the attendant announced that the plane was overbooked. She began offering cash, but she did so while hamming it up like Monty Hall on “Let’s Make A Deal.”

                    By the time she got to $300, she’d also thrown in some, in her words, “cheap” airline blankets, a box of airline peanuts, a photo op with the captain and a voucher for free drinks and burgers in the airline bar. In 15 minutes, people were laughing, but some took the bait and the flight quietly proceeded as planned.

                   She made giving up the blue chair, in this case the airline seat, worthwhile.

                 So, United Airlines, if you want to solve your customer relations problem, start talking to some kindergarten teachers.

 This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

          Easter is a religious holiday to celebrate the Resurrection. But there’s an evil part to the holiday, one that lurks on the store aisle dedicated to everything Easter – Mini Cadbury Eggs. These devilishly delicious treats are solid milk chocolate covered with a crispy sugar shell. And not cheap chocolate either. Mini Cadbury Eggs are rich, velvety chocolate with a just-right thin candy shell covering decadent chocolate, and they’re Easter’s answer to crack cocaine.  

          Sure there’s other Easter candy, and they all have their own merit. There’s jelly beans in every color and flavor. As kids, we seldom thought to wonder about the flavor of the jelly beans, but every once in a while, we’d eat one with our eyes closed and guess the flavor. Cherry or strawberry was easy – those were red. Lemon jelly beans were yellow and coconut or pineapple — two flavors we ignored when there were red strawberry jelly beans to inhale – were white. The licorice candies were immediately swapped out of my unsuspecting little brother’s basket for all his red and orange ones. Grape turned out to be, surprise, the purple ones, and orange was, well, orange. But the green ones were a mystery.

             We couldn’t think of a green fruit, so, to the Hebert siblings, green jelly beans tasted green, and that was the flavor we assigned to all green jelly beans.

              The Easter Bunny always included a chocolate bunny in our baskets, tucked into green plastic grass along with the Easter eggs we’d dyed the night before. Nestled in with the jelly beans were handfuls of M&Ms and assorted chocolate balls wrapped in colorful foil. Those chocolate balls always had a waxy taste, so I’d toss those into my unsuspecting sister’s basket while stealing her orange jelly beans. Not the green ones, though because those tasted, well, green.

               The Easter Bunny learned our preferences over the years and adjusted accordingly. My sister didn’t particularly like chocolate, so the bunny left her a white chocolate rabbit. I preferred peanut M&Ms over the plain M&Ms, so the Easter Bunny knew to dump more of those in my basket than my brother’s.

                 But no American Easter basket is complete without a package of iconic marshmallow Peeps tucked behind the chocolate bunny.  For those who’ve been living on a desert island, Peeps are a blob of marshmallow covered with bright yellow sugar in a shape that somewhat resembles a small chick. But they’re more than a replica of a cute Easter icon. Peeps are required in an American Easter basket, even if you don’t like them. But adore them people do.  One Website claims that 5.5 million Peeps are made every day, and they’re still hard to find on the shelves the closer we get to Easter Sunday.

                  Peeps originally came in bright yellow because they were supposed to resemble chicks. But modern candy lovers have a variety of colorful and creative Peeps to choose from, including coconut or blueberry Peeps dipped in chocolate, vanilla Peeps dipped in white fudge and there’s even a suggestion to pair strawberry Peeps with moscato rose wine for the grown-up Peeps connoisseur.

                   This year, there’s one variety of Peeps that could give my Mini Cadbury Eggs a run for their money – chocolate mousse Peeps dipped in creamy milk chocolate.

                    Here’s hoping the Easter Bunny drops both in my basket this year. That way, I can answer the age-old question – which came first – the Peeps chick or the Cadbury egg by eating every one of them the bunny leaves in my basket. Happy Easter!

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

            On Thursday, I started watching the weather radar for the Houston area. We were planning a trip to see our son and his family, and I wanted to keep the weather in mind. Spring is a fickle time in Texas, so I was hoping I’d see a forecast of sunny days and no rain.

            That wasn’t the case.

            The weather channels called for a 100 percent chance of showers with two to five inches of rain over the weekend.

Words like “Armageddon” and “shelter-in-place” were featured along with big red circles of damaging rains and winds radiating out from the middle of Houston almost all the way to San Antonio.

            I prayed, I bargained, I made a pact with the powers that be to change the forecast. During a conversation with my son, I told him we might not be able to come if the weather was bad because I didn’t want to drive through a torrential rainstorm with his four precious children in the car.

            For two days, I fretted and worried and watched the weather channel. On Saturday, my son and I decided the weather was going to be too bad so we’d get together another time.

In a way, I was relieved because we wouldn’t have to face the flooding and treacherous conditions on the roadways.

            On Sunday morning, I awoke to some sprinkles.

            “The worst is yet to come,” I thought as I looked at the weather radar for the hundredth time that morning. There was a huge line of squalls to the west of us, but nothing to the east.

            Breakfast came and the sprinkles stopped. Lunch came and the sun came out. I thought about going out and running errands, but the weatherman’s promise of Armageddon kept me inside.

            Throughout the afternoon and evening, I’d look out the window and kick myself for letting fear put the brakes on my plans.

             All my life, I’ve let the “that might happen” stop me from doing what I wanted to do. I’m not talking about driving to the beach when a hurricane’s blowing in from the Gulf. It’s the threat of “that could be bad” that always gets in my way.

             The next day, I saw a post on Facebook that my sister’s house in Alexandria, La. had flooded. The storm that bypassed us hit them like Thor’s hammer, and they unexpectedly got over three inches of water in their home.

               Surprisingly, Diane said they were lucky – they’d have to replace the floors and the carpeting, and she needed new floors anyway. There’s a photo of Diane and her husband in their front yard wearing rain boots, standing in ankle-deep flood water with big smiles on their faces.

                They were smiling through the catastrophe because, as my sister said, there was nothing they could do about what happened. She said crying wasn’t going to dry up that water or get her carpets pulled up and she had to look on the positive side.

                  After hearing her laughing that they could still run the air conditioner and sit on their couch – even though there was an inch of rain underneath their furniture – made me ashamed that I’d worried myself out of time with my family because of a “what if.”

                   The “what if” happened to her and she accepted what happened, rolled up her sleeves and got to work without whining or complaining.

                   I’ve always thought my sister was incredible, and I’m convinced she’s more than that. She’s also a realist who taught me a valuable lesson – when life gives you lemons, cut those babies up, put them in a pitcher with a little bit of medicinal vodka and crank up the music.

                   And keep on living.

 This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

 

The industry is promising a better-than-average crawfish season this year, and this Cajun girl couldn’t be happier.

I grew up in the North where my connection with Louisiana food was mostly through stories I heard from my Southern relatives. It wasn’t until we moved to Louisiana when I was a young teen that I became acquainted with Louisiana seafood.

The marshlands around Lake Charles were our classroom as my dad and our Uncle Howard taught us how to catch dinner from the bayous. The lesson started with wading out into shallow waters with nets and bait.

They taught us how to tie the bait to a triangular net and how to carefully check those nets every half hour.  We were thrilled when we’d pull up a trap and see mudbugs and crabs nibbling on the bait because we knew there was a crawfish boil in our immediate future.

The first time I went to a crawfish boil, I didn’t know what to expect. There was a big gray metal washtub in the back yard filled with swarming crawfish. Some had big claws while some were missing either one or both claws. My dad explained that those were the ones who’d lost the fight, but they would still be good eating.

Between the cooks, there were friendly arguments about every step of the cooking process.Seasoning was the first argument. Some put the seasoning on once the crawfish hit the pot. Others seasoned the water before adding the crawfish. Some added Tabasco sauce. Some sprinkled Tony Chachere’s Cajun Seasoning liberally into the water. Most agreed, however, that cayenne pepper is required.

We were a family that added potatoes and corn-on-the-cob in with the crawfish. I remember the first time I bit into the corn and feeling my mouth catch on fire from the red pepper. My dad laughed and told me the potatoes and corn suck up the seasoning so be careful about taking a big bite without slathering it in butter first.

While we waited for the crawfish to cook, it was the youngsters’ job to cover the picnic tables with old newspapers and make sure there were lots of rolls of paper towels. We also put out small bowls to mix ketchup and Tabasco sauce for those who liked their crawfish extra spicy.

Once the seasoning debate was settled, then it was a heated debate about whether it was better to dump ice on the crawfish to stop them from cooking once they’d turned a deep shade of cinnamon or dump them on the table and watch the steam rise.

We didn’t care what method the grownups used as long as there was a giant pile of crawfish to dig into. When the crawfish were cooked to the chef’s degree of satisfaction, the cooks would dump piles of crawfish along the middle of the table, and everybody pulled a pile toward them.

Our Cajun relatives believed we needed to know how to properly peel and eat crawfish. Uncle Howard taught me how to grab the tail, squeeze the sides, twist it and then carefully pull out the meat.

It was a lucky day if the tail came out intact and an even luckier day if we could take the pincher on the claw, twist it and wiggle the meat from the claw. If we were hungry, we’d put the claws to the side to tackle after the crawfish were all gone and we were waiting for the next batch.

The best parts of a crawfish boil are the Cajun music playing in the background, the hum of the propane tank heating the water and the sounds of cards hitting a table while the grownups play boo-ray for nickels.

My dad and uncle aren’t with us anymore, but their spirit is with me every time I sit down to a platter of freshly cooked crawfish and silently thank them for the Cajun life lessons.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

            Waking up isn’t easy. In the past, people used wind-up alarm clocks until electric clock radios came along. These days, people use their cell phones for everything, including as an alarm clock. But I’m an old-fashioned soul when it comes to coming out of a deep sleep. I like hearing the soothing voice of Steve Inskeep on National Public Radio first thing in the morning.

            Years ago, my mom gave us a clock-radio alarm clock as a Christmas gift, and the dual-alarm setting has come in handy. But over time, the volume knob developed a short and recently would only play at an ear-splitting level or at a whisper.

            Being a sound sleeper, I chose the loud level.

            Finally my husband said waking up to that decibel of doom and gloom that only NPR can deliver was enough.

            So I headed to Target and scanned the shelves for a digital clock radio. I was delighted to see that one of the few clocks offered had a dual-alarm function and an easy-to-read digital display. I came home, plugged in the new clock and attempted to set the time.

            I pressed the buttons. The time never budged from blinking 12:00. I tried pressing different buttons. Still the 12:00 blinked on and off. I got the directions out, read them and tried again. Still no change from the 12:00.

            Defective, I thought, so I returned it to the store and got a different brand. I brought it home, plugged it in and tried to change the time.

            Nothing.

            Every time I pressed the hour button, the radio station changed. After hearing the same rap song a dozen times, I figured maybe the radio needed the batteries installed to effectively change the time.

I hunted around and scrounged up two AA batteries. I put them in and tried to change the time again.

            The numbers 12:00 kept blinking.

            Frustrated, I went for the big guns – my engineer husband. I told him I couldn’t figure out how to change the time on the clock radio and asked if he’d set the time.

            Twenty minutes later, he told me he couldn’t get the time to change either. I headed back to Target and returned the clock radio. I’d exhausted all the models of clock radios they had so I drove over to Best Buy. I found a clock radio but, this time, I stopped at the Geek Squad desk and asked the associate to humor me.

            “This is the third clock radio I’ve bought in three weeks,” I told him and then related the story of my bad luck. He plugged in the radio and set the time, showing me the two steps he used to get rid of the blinking 12:00.

            “Easy,” he told me. “You’ll have no problem.”

            So I rushed home and plugged in the clock radio before I’d forget how to reset the time. The clock blinked 12:00, and I pressed the buttons, just like the Geek Squad guy did.

            Nothing.

            Twenty minutes later, I gave up and reached a logical conclusion.

            I’m going to join the 21^st century and use my cell phone as an alarm clock. I know it works, I know it keeps up with daylight savings time and I can choose from 20 different alarm sounds. As I unplugged the old alarm clock, I couldn’t bring myself to toss it in the trash after 20 years of faithful service.

             So I gave her a place of honor on the night stand where she’ll still display the time while her modern counterpart sounds the alarm.  

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

             

Recently, I saw an online photo gallery featuring the fashion choices Britain’s Duchess of Cambridge, Kate Middleton, has made since she’s come into the royal spotlight.

Fashionistas ooh and aah over her made-to-fit coats, designer dresses, tailored jackets and diamond-studded tiaras that look quite regal atop those long, thick brunette locks. Reporters gush about how Kate has embraced looking absolutely stunning every time she steps out of the royal limousine.

Well not all of us can be a duchess or a princess, but I also dress for different occasions. The main difference is my fashion choices aren’t reported in the news. Also, I don’t think my fashion choices are on the same level as the duchess.

So here’s the Queen of Calamity – it’s just me – reporting on the fashion choices the queens of calamity and clumsiness make as we blunder and stumble through our day.

Here I am at the grocery store on a cold day. The grey sweat pants match quite nicely with the black knee socks – don’t mind the holes — that coordinate with the sweatshirt and the LSU hoodie.

The spaghetti sauce and Ivory Linen paint stains make a nice pairing with the make-up-free face and the “I Believe in Bigfoot” baseball cap.

On summer days, life for the queen is a lot easier. It’s khaki shorts with 99-cent flip flops and a white or red T-shirt. No need to overdress when it’s 98 degrees outside.

Then there’s the go-to-work look. The Queen of Calamity has a variety of beige pants in her closet. She thinks they match everything, so she either wears the khaki-colored pants with an elastic waist or the tan Capri slacks with any shirt or sweater in her closet.

Let’s not forget the going-to-the-movies look. The queen does manage to switch out the khaki pants with the sweat pants for this outing.

Not the same stain-filled sweat pants but the baggy black sweat pants. That’s because they coordinate with the black T-shirt and oversized black purse. Her purse is probably considered vintage since the queen has lugged that suitcase around since the late 1990s.

Since we mentioned the purse, let’s talk accessories. The queen favors that huge black imitation leather purse because she can haul around the essentials – three notebooks for when an interview or the need to write down a grocery list pops up, two boxes of Tic-Tacs and 15 pens. A writer always needs an extra pen, and reporters can’t resist free pens from the credit union.

Queens of calamity also need shoes to match every outfit. There’s the white tennis shoes to wear to work. Then there’s the dirty white tennis shoes to wear with the sweat pants.

There’s also the grease-stained tennis shoes to wear to the grocery store. The queen said that, in all fairness, she must admit that there’s really only one pair of tennis shoes in her closet. She just labels them differently for different occasions.

Special occasions take the fashion choices to a new level. The queen favors the minimalistic look – no fancy jewelry except for a pair of gold hoop earrings. If they were good enough in 1985, they’re good enough to wear today.

Vintage, you know.

In fact, the vintage look encompasses quite a bit of the queen’s wardrobe. There’s the 2012 T-shirt with the kitten on the front. Cotton gets pretty soft after all those years, and who wouldn’t love a soft cotton shirt with a kitten on the front?

There’s the whole selection of holiday T-shirts, from garish orange shirts for Halloween to the red and green Rudolph T-shirt that’s acceptable from Nov. 29 all the way through Dec. 31.

And, for simplicity, there’s a couple of white T-shirts, red T-shirts and black T-shirts that coordinate with every single holiday. All come with stains because the queen of calamity is quite clumsy.

So while Kate Middleton makes headlines everywhere she goes, the queen of calamity goes about her day in quiet anonymity. But if you want to find her, she’ll be the one wearing a stained white T-shirt and that Bigfoot baseball cap.

The queen’s tiara’s at the cleaners.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

 

 

 

Every Saturday morning, my husband had a ritual he followed without fail – run, shower, eat breakfast and then check the oil, tire pressure and windshield wiper fluids in my vehicle. I have a priceless photo of his legs sticking out from underneath the car accompanied by a 2-year-old’s legs – our youngest boy who followed his dad everywhere. Our 5-year-old grandson follows his father everywhere and is starting to help out with chores, doing things just like he sees his father.

Parents are always teaching their children skills they think they’ll need in life, passing down knowledge they learned from their parents. Most of the time, we parents don’t think the lessons are being absorbed.

But children do watch and learn, and I did the same with my parents.

My dad was a resourceful parent, always full of surprises and bursts of imaginative ways to do almost anything. There were only three things Dad needed to fix anything – black electrical tape, duct tape and a hammer.

My brother likes to tell the story about a lawn mower we had that stopped working one afternoon.

A little background – my Dad never bought anything brand new. A born salesman, Dad loved haggling with someone to get the best deal possible. Hence the reason we always had second-hand lawn mowers and vehicles.

One afternoon, the old mower stopped working. My brother tinkered and sweated over that mower, and then Dad came over to see what was going on. He said he needed a hammer to fix the problem.

Long accustomed to Dad’s ways with hammers, my brother thought the old guy would come back from the tool shed with one of his beat-up hammers.  Dad did better than that – he came out with a sledgehammer, gave the lawn mower a ringing blow and, low and behold, the mower started.

Inventiveness was Dad’s strong suit, and most of the time, he’d solve the problem. But sometimes, his ideas were off the chart.

Years ago, my parents lived on a corner lot with lots of trees. There was an old pine tree near the driveway, and one of the bigger branches, in Dad’s opinion, needed to be removed.

The branch was high up, so Dad hauled out his rickety metal ladder, pulled his van up underneath the branch and then put the ladder on top of his van.

I glanced out the kitchen window and saw him sawing on that branch and realized what was going to happen – when he finished sawing all the way through the branch, the heavy branch would fall directly on his windshield.

Instead of going outside and sounding the alarm, I called my sister, barely able to tell her what was going on because I was laughing so hard – seeing my Dad on top of his van standing on a wobbling ladder as he sawed away was one of the funniest things I’d ever seen.

But I realized I needed to tell him what the end result would be, so I ran out, stopped him and explained what was going to happen if he kept sawing. He looked at the branch, looked at the tree, looked at his windshield and agreed I was right.

So he leaned the ladder against the trunk of the tree, moved his van, tied a rope to the branch and told me to pull hard as he went back to sawing.

I did exactly what he told me until I realized that when he sawed all the way through, I’d be pulling on the branch and that huge hunk of wood would hit me square in the face.

I immediately yelled at him to hold up, and he thought I’d lost my mind for stopping him on while carrying out an incredibly good idea.

Once again, I explained the laws of gravity. He saw what would happen and then grudgingly agreed to let the branch fall to the driveway on its own.

I thought about that afternoon when I was standing on a kitchen chair last night and grabbed the hammer to use the claw end to retrieve something from the top shelf in my closet.

My dad would be so proud.

 

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

 

 

            Our niece is getting married this summer, and there’s a wedding shower in a couple of weeks. Like most brides these days, Kayla and Nolan are registered at a gift store, so I checked the registry to see what they needed and wanted.

            No surprise, my niece is going for a clean, crisp look. The appliances and items she’s chosen are pretty, practical and useful. I’ve shopped on this site for other couples requesting $50 salt-and-pepper shakers and shook my head in dismay, thinking that couple’s in for a rude awakening.

            Starting a family is expensive. New couples need everything, and not just big items. There’s the little things we take for granted after years of being married, but new couples start from scratch.

            Spices, condiments, drinking glasses, cleansers, trash cans, foil, breakfast cereal, frozen pizza – the list goes on and on. So helping a young couple get on their feet is a tradition most of us embrace and do our best to get them set up so they don’t have to worry about eating from take-out containers because there’s no plates in the cabinet.  

            As I looked over their list a little more carefully, I realized the things new couples really need aren’t listed on any registry and can’t be found in any store.

            Trust. A man and a woman who take their vows to love, honor and cherish for the rest of their lives have to trust that the other person really means what they promise at the altar. They also have to trust that if one breaks the covenant and asks for forgiveness, forgiveness will be given.

            Friendship. Husbands and wives have to be friends, not just lovers. Friendship in a marriage allows you to plan a vacation together so, at the end of the week, you’re still talking. When you’re married to your friend, you know if there’s a problem at work, your spouse will be there. They’ll patiently listen to you whine, complain and gnash your teeth about a situation they can’t fix.

            Tolerance. Let’s face it – we all have habits we don’t realize could cause someone to raise their eyebrows and question your upbringing. These include clipping your toenails while sitting on the living room couch, reading magazines in the bathroom and leaving facial hair and leg hair all over the bathroom floor.

            A blessing on all spouses who overlook the little annoyances.

            Amnesia. We all make mistakes, and nobody wants to be reminded of those mistakes for the next 50 years. Forgetting that your wife lost the debit card on vacation and never reminding her about it is gold in the bank. Casually forgetting that your husband bought an expensive video game he never plays is one of those purchases you need never bring up.

            Teamwork. Marriages are often described as partnerships. In a true partnership, each partner gives 50 percent and each partner contributes something different to the entity to make it work. In a marriage, it’s never even. Sometimes one will be giving 100 percent while the other regroups. Perhaps his job’s overwhelming, the kids are demanding or other family members need your wife’s attention. A functioning team understands that the team often works like a see saw, but in the end, balance is always sought and usually restored.

             Laughter. When the toilet’s overflowing and you’re both mopping as fast as you can while the buzzer’s going off in the kitchen, the phone’s ringing and your 2-year-old waddles in with a dirty diaper, you can either scream at each other or laugh. Take my advice on this one – laugh then cry and then laugh some more.

               The stuff – pots, pans, towels and coffee makers – are what you need to set up a household. The intangibles – trust, laughter and tolerance – are what you need to set up a home.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.