I’m Sorry

By: Samantha S. Daviss

Apologizing…it is one of the hardest actions we as humans must do on a daily basis. Only problem is we very rarely do it. Do we all think we are that faultless? Do we not think that our actions and words hurt others on a daily basis? Don’t get me wrong I am not saying the human race is a mean group of being, I am just saying that our actions on a daily basis sometimes require an apology, and saying you’re sorry doesn’t make you a weak person or a vulnerable person.

We all do it. We have lunch with one friend, and run into another; but subconsciously that uninvited friend is hurt. Even though they understand you need time with others, it still hurts, so just a simple “Hey, I’m sorry I didn’t holler at you, it was just a last minute get together”, is all it takes.

Or if you forget to RSVP for a party, you didn’t do it intentionally (at least let’s hope not), so a quick phone call to apologize for being negligent really does go a long way. Most people feel that if they apologize they are feeble or aren’t able to stand their ground. But in my eyes apologizing shows compassion, concern, and respect for others. It shows you aren’t wrapped up in your own life so much so that you aren’t aware you have hurt their feelings or neglected to pay attention to them; it shows you can turn and say “Hey I really messed up, and I’m sorry, it won’t happen again”.

Does that show weakness? No, in fact just the opposite…it shows kindness. And for some reason we all tend to be the least apologetic to those we are closest to: family, best friends, spouses and kids. I’m not sure why that is, maybe because we take each other for granted. Maybe because we know our love for one another is unconditional. I guess. But the fact of the matter is those that are closes to us should be treated with the utmost respect.

If you mess up, just say “I’m sorry!” It’s really not a hard concept. That apology will go for miles. If you speak harshly, or put demands on a loved one, or forget to do something they asked of you…just apologize. Apologizing is the greatest form of flattery. It means you care. It means you love them. It means you recognize their pain and you won’t do it again.

We are trying to instill that in our children. It is more difficult the older they get. It’s like they don’t want to apologize to admit defeat or that they messed up for fear they will get in trouble. But what they don’t understand is that by recognizing the faults, admitting them, and apologizing to us as parents will carry them further and keep them out of trouble longer.

Apologizing to the one closest to you is the most important—your spouse. When we argue or disagree with our spouse or partner, we tend to be our most stubborn. You don’t want to bow down and admit defeat, and defeat is an apology. Guess what…you aren’t always right. Believe it or not you are flawed too. Their poor actions or reactions could stem from something you did earlier or even a long time ago, or it could be an ongoing issue you aren’t willing to fess up to.

Learn to listen and apologize to your loved one. Before apologizing there are a few things to keep in mind when disagreeing with your better half.

1)      Try not to yell! Yelling really gets you nowhere. Talk…don’t yell.

2)      Hear their side of the story. Even though you may completely disagree or not understand why they did what they did…hear them out. In the end, it may make more sense to you.

3)      Be open-minded. Don’t always think your way is the right way, because it is NOT!

4)      At the end of the day…you love each other. No matter how badly you disagree, this is the person you chose to spend the rest of your life with, raise a family with and build a life with. Don’t hate them so much in that moment in time that you can see past that.

5)      Forgive and forget. To keep moving forward, you have to forgive…and don’t hold grudges, you must forget.

And at the end of the day you must apologize, because it is a two way street. On some level you were both wrong, so fess up and apologize.

Apologies are a beautiful thing. They are the sincerest form of flattery through showing respect.

A stiff apology is a second insult... The injured party does not want to be compensated because he has been wronged; he wants to be healed because he has been hurt. –Gilbert K. Chesterton

The only correct actions are those that demand no explanation and no apology. –Red Auerbach

So Far from “Back to the Future”

By: Samantha S. Daviss

I happened to run across “Back to the Future” the other day with my kiddos. It was a yucky, rainy day outside so it was the perfect indoor movie day. And having seen this movie as a kid I couldn’t imagine living to see the year 2015, it seemed so far off to me. I thought for some reason I would be an elder lady creeping up on like 100 years old. But instead I am just this “old” lady creeping up on 40!

But it made me laugh and wonder all in the same instant of just how far off we are from that programmed date in the time-traveling Dolorian of October 21, 2015. Can you believe it is just a few short eight months away?

And I have yet to see any flying space boards, or flying Dolorians with sky-high road ways, or miniature pizzas that you throw in the microwave and it expands to a normal pizza size. It’s amazing what our imaginations have us achieving or thinking is “the possible”, when in reality it is of no importance or interest to us, once that time has come and gone. Even though in this day and age we have achieved more than we could have thought possible back in 1985.

There are things not in the movie, that the producers probably couldn’t have even conceived 30 years ago. Like hand-held computers in our phones. Or the fact that tangible music would be a thing of the past (i.e. Walkmans, Discmans, or cassette tapes). Now it’s all downloaded or in “The Cloud” whatever that is (I still don’t understand “the cloud”).

But if you think about it, we really have come a long way in some ways, but taken so many steps back in others. For example, a step back, is the divorce rate is increasing due to social media and travelling for a living, the social skills of our youth are disappearing thanks to social media, phones, and every other gadget available to them.

With the negatives come the positives, thanks to social media we are able to keep in touch with friends and family members around the world; business and pleasure travel have become easier and more financial available; and our discoveries with the environment are making life easier and more environmentally friendly.

So you see change is good, we just have to accept it and move on. We may not always like it, but we just have to go with the flow. Life is way more hectic and complicated than it was in the 80s; things are moving at a faster pace and everyone seems to be pulled in 90 different directions, so sometimes our devices are handy at keeping us connected, but sometimes they interfere with the life we are living in the here and now.

Think back to 1985…forget about all the technological advances you thought would come about thanks to “Back to the Future”, but think about yourself. Whether you were just a kid, a teenager, or starting your young family out…when you would lay outside under the clouds and think about your life and who you wanted to be, did you achieve it 30 years later? Or at least come close to it? Or did your life take a completely different route than you would have ever expected?

I look back and see a little bit of my dreams that came true from 1985, but my life also took some pretty great twists and turns. I got to live abroad for a while, I went to a university that I never would have imagine attending (but it fit me like a glove), I married my childhood golfing buddy, and I have three wonderful boys (says the gal who never wanted children). So you see life has its own plan for you, and sometimes it’s fun to sit down and look back at just how blessed you are to have lived that life and the hills and valleys you encountered along the way.

The year 1985 was a long time ago, but if you think about it, it has gone by in a blink. I can only imagine what October 21, 2045 will bring to us all.

Super Lame, but Super Cool

By: Samantha S. Daviss

When you are young, like really young in your teens and 20s, you pretty much think everyone and everything is “lame”. You think your parents are lame for doing yard work, you think your teachers are lame for making you write a paper, you think your friends are lame when they don’t want to spend time with you.

But typically, people that think others are lame just aren’t comfortable doing what they are doing at the moment. You are trying to build yourself and your ego up, so you feel cooler or more awesome than everyone else in the world. When in reality, we all have a little bit of “lameness” in us. 

My life motto is to let your “Dork flag fly if you have one”. There are things I do in life that make me a total dork, and I’m okay with that label. I love to clean out my fridge, it makes me happy; I love to write, it releases a little voice in my head that needs to be released; and I love to sweep out my garage. I don’t do it often enough, but man when my garage floor is clean, I love it!

However, right now, my 22 year-old-self is crawling in a hole about to die from “lameness”. I’ve come to the reality though, that there are just some things you do as a maturing adult that at one point in your life would have made your younger self die, absolutely die, from embarrassment.

So with time, I guess comes, dorkiness…and I have compiled a list of things that are super awesome as adults, but would have been lame when we were younger, and two I have already named:

1)      To clean out my fridge

Living in a house of just boys takes a lot of patience and understanding. But with boys comes messes, lots and lots of messes. And the refrigerator has no pardon from their wrath. That poor refrigerator door is probably opened at least fifty times a day. Sometimes things are grabbed out of it, sometimes it just gets stared at…then suddenly I hear the screech of “Mom, there’s nothing to eat!” Which is obvious from the fully stocked fridge standing right in front of them.

But to no avail the fridge gets filthy. It doesn’t take long. I don’t know how it gets so dirty, but it does. And I love nothing more than to sit with my Lysol all-purpose cleaner and a roll of Bounty paper towels and scrub that baby from top to bottom. Re-organizing and putting everything back where it belongs. “Lameness” at its finest.

2)      To clean my garage

A busy household, filled with kids, jobs, and running in a million directions doesn’t allow for a lot of down time to tend to the little things around a house. And no matter how many times you ask everyone to put things back where they found them, it is never done. So that is where the messy garage comes into play. The toys are never put away, and leaves and mud are constantly tracked through.

But it’s nothing that a nice sturdy push broom and some organizing skills can’t fix.

 3)      To have my travel essentials ready and filled for a trip at a moment’s notice

My mother always told me to have my “travel kit” ready to go. “When you get home from a trip, always refill everything you ran out of.” I always thought it was a very odd rule (or suggestion), but now it makes total sense. I don’t have to run around thinking what I need to pack, what I would use every day, in addition to packing my clothes, the kids clothes and any extra necessities I may have to remember. So knowing my travel kit is ready to go at a moment’s notice, gives me such delight.

4)      Cleaning day

I have pampered myself with a cleaning person. I keep my house up in between her visits, but I don’t need to get me nails done, or my hair done, or tons of other pampering items. But my cleaning lady is my God send, truly. I am so happy the day she comes. There is nothing better than pulling in my garage from a long day at work and with the kids to smell Pine Sol seeping through the cracks of my back door.

It is such a joy and relief to know that, that one stress has been unloaded from my plate.

5)      Vacuuming my rugs

Yep the lines…the lines from a freshly vacuumed rug or carpet get me every time. I love to just walk into the room and see those symmetrical lines gliding across my floors. And as a younger me I would never have noticed, but now it is a sense of accomplishment, and adult lameness at its best.

6)      New car smell

I’m that person…I love new cars, and congratulations to those who get them. But when I admire your new car I really don’t notice the leather seats, or all the buttons to be pushed, or even the manufacturer’s name on the outside…it’s the smell that I love. I could lock myself in a new car for hours just admiring the clean floors, the clean seats, and the new car smell.

That smell gives me hope, but in the same breathe I know that hope is near the end. That new smell, the clean seats, and clean floors will soon be things of the past.

7)      Sitting by a campfire, without having to get drunk

Ahhh yes, the days of hanging out with friends, building campfires by the lake shore or in pastures, and partaking in some adult beverages. Those were the days. My younger self couldn’t even imagine not having a beverage around a campfire. I would say to my older self “What in the world is wrong with you? Let’s party.” But now campfires are peaceful, enjoyable, and fun to watch my kids run around. Plus I have the added bonus of doing an activity that doesn’t end in a hang-over, so double lame bonus there.

8)      Go back to school and get another degree just because

Who would want to go back to school just because? This gal. I once started my graduate degree, and pretty soon I am going to finish it…just because. How lame is that? It will help me learn more about by career, it won’t necessarily benefit my career, but it will help give me additional knowledge about it. And I want to finish it, just because. I know total dork here…but it has always been a goal of mine, so why not?

9)      A full tank of gas

Who doesn’t love knowing you are riding around with a full tank of gas? Instead of watching that red light flash at you reminding you that you are either too busy or too lazy to fill up your tank. I can’t tell you how many times I have had to drive to my son’s school to pick him up wondering if I would make it back to town to throw about $5 worth of gas in my tank. I am pretty sure I have more ulcers from my gas tank scares, than I do from any other stresses in my life.

But then there is that feeling of knowing for at least 385 miles I have nothing to worry about, and can go as far as I want to go.

10)   Cupboards and my refrigerator full of food

Grocery shopping, ugghhh…it’s the worst. I have to load up my basket, mark off my list, and then…PAY! But the worst part is the unloading. Especially when you have the amount of groceries I have every few weeks. It is a two to three hour ordeal.

But the joy and satisfaction I have when I am finished and my pantry shelves are full again, my refrigerator is stocked again, and my kids aren’t complaining anymore, is the best feeling in the world.

As you can see the older we get, I guess the lamer we get. It’s the little things in life that make us smile, that make us happy. So remember, when you see those vacuum lines on your floor and you smile, it’s okay to let your dork flag fly.

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