Valuable Advice

You can’t replace something with nothing.
A little punk boy full of piercings and tattoos told me this when I was in the my lowest, most depressed period and the clarity and reasoning of it was so monumental, it literally kept me alive through years of misery until, just as he promised, something came along.

I had paid a variety of therapists, from secular to theological, and never got such life-saving advice. The boyfriend is gone, and you just have to accept the fact that if having a boyfriend is important to you, things are going to suck until you find another one. If you don’t have a good job or even a job--and jobs are important to everyone--then things are going to suck until you get one. All you can do is develop the best coping strategies you can while you are in the Great Sucking Period of your life and not get fooled into thinking things will never get better so you might as well off yourself.

You never know how long it’s going to take, but things do get better. They just do. Eventually, the nothingness gets filled with somethingness. And looking back, I can see now that every turn was a turn for the better (because, really, how could it have gotten worse?) When you’re in the middle of it, you don’t see that part. As another old adage goes, when you’re down, there’s nowhere to go but up.

Floss your teeth in the shower.
My stepfather-in-law gave me that advice. We’re all constantly told by our dentists we don’t floss enough, and who has time? My stepdad-in-law is not the master of multi-tasking, but he came up with a solution that made me, the actual master of multi-tasking, slap myself! Why didn’t I think of that?

You’re always in there a few extra delicious minutes anyway, soaking up the hot water. What better time to floss? Keep a package next to your shampoo and shock and awe your dentist at your next check-up.

Change your oil every 3,000 miles.
You know those abandoned cars you see on the side of the road with the orange stickers on them? That was my first husband. His idea of car maintenance was keep driving them until they stopped and then just walk away and get another one. The next husband was vaguely aware that maybe you should get an oil change when you got the car inspected, so our cars kept us in suspense. Would they survive to the last payment?

My current husband is the master of the 200,000 mile vehicles. He keeps cars running when all the body and upholstery has long since rotted away. He drives his cars until they are Flintstone mobiles, just engines with wheels. Our porch is constantly stocked with oil and air filters. Every few months, testosterone bubbles and he marches into the yard and changes the oil in everything parked there.

You can’t change people.
Probably some television therapist said this, or maybe I just figured it out after a long time. What you see is what you're going to get...forever and for all time. And it doesn't matter what they say about changing. They won't. They don't. The only thing that can change is you stop trying to change them.