Advice

I don't ask for advice often. And for good reason. That being in that if I don't respect you,why would I listen to what advice you have to give? (And this, my dear Dell, is why it is of the utmost important that 1. Your children respect you and 2. That you be a respectable person.)

Sure, we all screw up, stumble into a mess, get dirty. Everyone has those times. I'm a living, walking, talking example of that right now. I'm talking about overall. Who are you overall.

I've gotten some advice lately. Of course, I didn't ask for it, but people feel oh so inclined to offer. Maybe the "Kick Me" sign fell off my back and was replaced with a "Give Sucky Advice" sign. Let's take a look at some of the advice I've been given recently:

Time heals all wounds. Ahh, isn't that sweet? So, to heal all my wounds, all I need is time (and an endless supply of vicadin). Time heals all wounds? No it doesn't! Who first uttered those words, Father Time? Someone with no sense of time? A person with a stop watch? Time heals all wounds about as well as a piece of glass in the bottom of your foot heals without attention. Of course, this is coming from the "A" type personality, who likes everything buttoned up, in order and properly filed. Maybe if you're a different personality, this works for you, as you happily skip through life with your pretty little red cape and basket full of time. (Can I just say, what a bucket'o'crap!)

Here's another big hitter someone told me:

Do what you want, as long as it makes you happy. You know what would really make me happy? Catching the person who broke my window and stole my purse, ran up my debit card, chewed my new pack of gum and threw out my expensive lipstick! I'd like to catch them, then pull out their fingernails one by one, shove my lipstick up their nose so high it touches their brain, and smoosh my pre-chewed gum into their armpit hair. Then I'd like to string them up from a tree, naked, and use them as a live pinata. That would make me happy.... Or perhaps I'd like to reek a little revenge in line with the Carrie Underwood song and (we're sorry to interrupt this program, but due to the rating of the following material, we are not able to approve it for public viewing)...

Doing what makes me happy is so relative, it's worthless advice. No great leader throughout history has left a profound mark in this world by just doing whatever made them happy. Unless you count Bill Clinton, who, let's remember, "Did not have sex with that woman--Monica Lewinski." C'mon Bill, who'd you think you were foolin'?

Then there's:

Don't give up! Keep fighting! You must fight! This was my least favorite advice because it was the best advice, and it actually came from someone I respected. And do still respect. It's true that all good things in life come with a price tag, and it's at the moment when times are tough that we need to really decide, "Am I going to fight, or am I going to run?" And very few fight. It's much easier to run. So, so, so much easier. It's not about time magically healing things, or doing what makes you happy, it's about doing battle, though you're tired and worn and have been on the field much too long. It's about giving everything you have, and more, to fight for what's worth bleeding, dying, and living for.

I have found more and more lately, that if you don't know what you stand for, you'll fall for anything.

And anything has many a face. Anything wears many a hat, sings many a tune. Anything can be just that: anything. And oh how quickly the fall into anything is. It's not a rolling grassy knoll, it's a jagged, going-nowhere-but-down, pitch black plunge.

Stand firm, don't stumble. And then go.

Go, fight, win!