Wednesday, June 1, 2016

Attitude says a lot about your gratitude



I wanted to reach through the television and strangle her little bony neck.  I longed to just slap her into tomorrow as I labored through her terrible little I’m-a-cute-girl voice. She stirred feelings of deep hate inside of me as I watched her complain, bitch and WHINE…
About her Property Brothers, HGTV FREE home renovation in her $710,000 home!!!
Where do these people come from?  Who raises these ungrateful little snots?

I punched the pause button on the clicker to temporarily silence her tiresome complaints and headed to the kitchen for some ice tea.  As I wacked the ice maker button to make it work (redneck trick y’all) I wondered if maybe I’d just become too simple.  After all, I woke up with running water this morning (although slow because our water pressure is iffy in this 1890s farmhouse) 

While I was in the kitchen I stopped by our very rustic laundry room to check on the dryer, yep, I needed to open and close the door again and give it a good thump. EEEEeeeeeekkkkkkkk thu-da da da da dump.  That’s the sound it makes back at me when we go through this but I have already had my Come-to-Jesus moment with it once this year.  I calmly explained it was the range/oven/cookey thingy’s year to be replaced and Mr. Clothes Dryer, you can just get back in line.  You can cut in front of Mr. Refridgerator who is as ugly as sin and will likely survive the apocalypse. 

So you understand my disgust that this young 20-something’s behavior and ungrateful like attitude at the lovely FREE help she was getting in re-making an ENTIRE HOME to fulfill her very desire and wish.  I felt so sorry for her handsome but-balding-way-too-early husband.  I’m already Team Husband at this point but I figure the man must be some kind of saint to live with this day in and day out.

“Ewe, I can NOT live in a house with a bathroom like that!  I can NOT! That will NOT be OK”  she heavily breathes into the camera as she licks her lips to make sure she looks Kardashian sexy while protesting.  You would have thought the Property Brothers were asking her to set up her domicile in a dirt floor African hut complete with a colony of flies and a village of Ebola patients in the next village over.

“My MUST haves for the bathroom include a bathtub, shower (but a SPA rain forest like shower, it must be SPA like) double vanity sinks although it is going to be MY bathroom, HE has to have his own bathroom.  I’m not sharing because my mom told me the secret to a happy marriage is SEPARATE bathrooms, AND a BIDET!!”  (A bidet is a fancy little floor sink thing that splashes water up in your private parts so you feel fresh after you do your bathroom biz)
“That’s all I need, really!” B gurl finishes up her requirement list and shoots a look at her hubby who really seems afraid to disagree with her as if she is a terrorist with her arms around his dear mother’s neck and a bomb strapped to her.  Speaking of Mothers, I’ll get back to that later.

The couple wanted a New York lofty feel to their suburban home which was actually about three and a half feet from their neighbor’s.  They insisted upon tearing out a wall to expose the exposed brick, very trendy, hip and lofty.  Ok.  So the hard working team did not find any exposed brick when tearing out a wall so they did a faux brick wall instead.  That’s fine and dandy but seems a little tasky when they could’ve just dealt with the wall they had.  Earlier, the poor hubby had mentioned they just got married and were waaaaaaaaaaaay over budget, and I’m kinda starting to understand how and why.

When they finished and showed the beautiful before and after shots with the cool computer generated animation of the project, it did look very nice.  But I wondered how happy of a home that would really end up being ten years from now.  Sure they have a beautiful home in which to entertain friends and family, but if she doesn’t do some serious RENOVATION on her attitude and get some gratitude, she won’t be able to pay folks to sit in her swanky, hip, lofty living room.

I’m about two hissy fits away from thinking I’m having the big one, the nervous breakdown many days when we have water leaking in the basement and something big breaks around here.  I think I’d love to have one of those homes you see all gussied up and renovated on those shows.  Then I remember that most days I have it good.  I have a bed to sleep in, family who loves me, cats who catch barn mice, dogs who greet me with slobbery kisses, a Honda that starts right up, friends who will carry a casserole to my house on a moment’s notice if one of us is sick, a great church family, nice hair, I can touch my toes and still run a 9-and-a-half-minute mile, and a Savior who died on the cross for my sins.  Which is good because I called that little B a few non-Christian like things in my head while watching that episode.  And I realize that she doesn’t get it.  Her mama told her the key to a happy marriage is separate bathrooms and if that’s her big worry, life will be very difficult and dark for this girl.  

I hope I get it.  Even if I don’t get a renovated home, I have a lot.  Really …a lot!

~Carry on
Anne Boswell Taylor

#PropertyBrothers #HGTV #Gratitude