My father had many strengths. Unfortunately, like his sons, he also had many weaknesses. One of his chief weaknesses was the tendency to take almost any situation and spot the negative in it—and, to spend a considerable period of time talking about it.
One time the principal in our school allowed the disciplinary situation to get completely out of hand. In fact, it got so bad that he threatened to resign unless it improved. My father decided to go by and talk to the principal to see what the problem was and to see if he could persuade him to stay on the job. After going by to talk to him, my father was giving my mother a report on the conversation they had had. I was interested in the situation at school since most of the ones causing the problems were about my age. I was listening in on the conversation. My younger brother Rick, who was in about the seventh grade at the time, was completely uninterested. He was sitting on the sofa eating a bowl of fruit loops and watching “Huckleberry Hound†on television. He was at peace with the world.
My father said that he asked the principal if his boys (meaning my younger brother and me) were part of the problem. Were we behaving? He quoted the principal as saying no, that he wished he had a hundred students like Lynn (I breathed a big sigh of relief when I heard that). And then my father looked over at Rick as he was eating his fruit loops and watching “Huckleberry Hound†and said, “But he didn’t say anything about Rickey and what he was doing. What have you been up to boy?†Why it was enough to make him choke on his fruit loops and lose all interest in Huckleberry Hound.
I’m afraid that we all have the tendency to overlook the positive in our rush to find something negative in every situation. That has an extremely destructive effect on life and on relationships.
I heard of a husband and wife who visited the Grand Canyon. As they were visiting the canyon, they got into a big argument. The wife said to her husband, “You correct everything I say. One more correction from you, and I’m throwing myself off that cliff.†Her husband said, “That’s not a cliff; that’s a bluff.â€
The fact of the matter is that we all have our faults. One observer said that the formula for a happy marriage is the same as the one for living in California: When you find a fault, don’t dwell on it.
Arthur Gordon told of visiting an old cemetery in the Deep South. As he looked at the stones, there was one marking the final resting place of somebody’s “Beloved Wife†who died in 1865. This was her epitaph: “Ever she sought the best, ever found it.†She had been living through a hideous war that had undoubtedly cost her a lot. Yet someone who knew her had written that she always looked for the best, and always found it. Not a bad epitaph for life! What would your epitaph be?
