Men Need To Man Up

Today was very trying to say the least. It started off nicely enough because I managed to rotate my sleep pattern to fit my off nights and I woke early for a nice Friday off. I checked the comments on my blog and enjoyed them. No Virus or Hacking attempts. That is always good. I then jumped on face book where my brother had towed the line of my blog and I had to spend a little while defending him from those who believe you must be a weakling if you believe in the bible. That was quite disgusting. Then I got my children up for school and my youngest missed the bus. According to her my string of curse words was a sign of me going “Psycho”. Well, Okay! The rest of my day went decent enough until time for my son to be taken to baseball practice. We get a flat tire in my oldest daughter’s car and pull into a Kangaroo. No problem, I change flats all the time at work on the side of the interstate with cars passing me at 80 MPH plus within 3 feet of me. Well, I find the little donut in Amber’s car, but there is no jack or tire tool. Great! A Good Samaritan will help right? My wife asks a man at the pump if he had a jack we could use. He tells her that his car was bought two days ago and he really did not want to look to find his jack. Well thank you half man! Another rejection for help and my son and I started off walking for home. I was seething inside thinking that is just how the world is these days that people are selfish and unwilling to help. My 13 year-old son said “Well, people are probably afraid to help others these days”. What would he know? He is only 13, as if he grew up 3 decades ago. But I said yes, you’re probably right. It didn’t help much I was still seething thinking of how wimpy we American’s have become. It isn’t a good idea to think on politics when your walking because you are broke down somewhere. But I kept thinking that men just don’t seem to be men anymore. Either they are selfish and too self concerned to lend a hand to help someone out or Isaac is right. It could just be fear. Fear over what? It wasn’t like it was midnight on the interstate. Brother that is just weak. The thought hit me that this is the reason we have to pay police officer’s to do the defending of other’s because there are just not enough courageous men out there that will intervene when trouble comes our way. Hell, even boy scouts walk old women across the street. Or at least they use to. Do they still do that anymore? I would rather think men were still men, but only preoccupied with there own problems to stop and help another without having to be paid to do so like I am. So on we went towards the house and on the way Isaac convinces me against my better judgment to take a short cut across this neighborhood to get to mine. He reassured me three times he knew the way. Wrong! I have never hiked so many paved hills in my life. I had been telling myself I needed to get in shape and exercise but right now was not the time. After we came upon a street we were on about 30 minutes before I realized we were back tracking. Yes, I almost had an aneurism when I found we had come full circle. Isaac was waiting on me to go “Psycho” as Abbie likes to say, but I kept the cursing to myself and my splendid luck. Finally, I called my wife and told her the embarrassing story of were we were not and suggested she walk home with Abbie. After another half hour of pulling hills with my fat butt in tow my wife called and said her friend Kelly Sawtell saw her and took her to get the other car. Anyway, once we were back to the car with a flat, my wife drove up with the car and we got the jack out. I started to remove the lugs but the tire tool did not fit the size of lugs on the car. I rubbed my hands through my sweaty hair in frustration when a man approached and offered his jack. It did not fit either, so he gave me a ratchet tool and we found the right size socket. I started using it and felt that it would break. I told him this and he assured me to try, that it didn’t matter if it broke. It broke! I felt bad and that was my last chance. The man said he was the Pastor of Helena United Methodist church and offered to call people in his congregation to see who could help. I declined the offer and thanked him for our imposing and his time trying to help. He was a nice gentleman and apparently unafraid to help. I don’t know, maybe Methodist are more manly than the Baptist and Catholics in the area? But anyway, this Methodist preacher was the only one willing to help and it meant a lot to me. I still think men today need to man up and grow some whether it is to help another or stand up for their country that is under siege or to protect at least their own families. I have no doubt the Methodist preacher would. So this was my day and enough of my bad attitude and a poor Friday. Let the storms roll on that are coming. At least my family and friends are safe tonight. Thank God for that!