I Am Nothing If Not Opinionated

Once I knew a man who appeared to be enjoying a full life. His home was lovely and he kept a manicured lawn accompanied by a vegetable garden that looked like a photo out of a Southern Living magazine. Working 16 hours a day, he was drawing lots of overtime and did his best to magnify his callings at church.

In spite of a cheerful facade, he was crumbling emotionally. Both he and his wife had serious health concerns while every one of his adult children were making poor, life-altering choices and he was physically exhausted, understandably depressed and feeling overwhelmed. In a weak moment during a short visit with me, he shared that he was unsure whether "life was worth living anymore".

And then, they wrapped his house with toilet paper. It must have been great fun because it was the best "job" of TPing I had personally ever seen. Now, in addition to the burden he was already carrying, he had the chore of cleaning up his beautiful yard, forced to leave unreachable shards of toilet paper in the tops of the trees for weeks as an embarrassing and constant reminder that he cannot do it all. Isn't that just hilarious?

Fast forward to life with my daughter, Jennifer. A mother of three beautiful young children, blessed with a full-time position as a teacher, active in church, with a supportive family and lots of friends. They have a lovely home and she is at this time, able to meet her financial obligations.

But for several years she has been plagued with chronic health problems, depending heavily on her husband at times. Then, he suddenly and unexpectedly died and she was hospitalized several times ~ even had surgery. In the midst of grief, with sole responsibility for the welfare of three very busy children, the daily quagmire of endless laundry, a job, maintaining a home and worrying about paying the bills, all the while feeling lousy physically, left her with an overwhelming sense of inadequacy. Now, that's laughable, isn't it?

And then they wrapped her house. It was about 3am and they rang the doorbell before they left, causing a panic attack substantial enough for Jen to call the police, who informed her that her yard had been wrapped. Terrified and unable to calm down, she called someone to stay the remainder of the night with her and her children Add that clean up job to her equation.

The lesson here is that we cannot possibly know what lurks in the lives of others. Victims make light of it and try to be good sports outwardly, rationalizing it away as an expression of affection for them. If I live to be a hundred years old, I will never see the humor in pouring water on a drowning man (or woman). My mother, who passed away August 2005, had lots of sayings. One of them was "Right is Right and Wrong ain't Nobody". Doesn't really make sense, but since I was raised with it, I knew it to mean that some things are just not appropriate.

May I suggest, if you want to show your love for me, place the largest package of bathroom tissue you can find, intact, on my front porch and I promise it will be welcome and appreciated every time! That's my opinion and I'm stickin' to it.