I was listening to Rick and Bubba this morning and they were playing the segment of the guys were on Hannity last night on Fox News. They have a new book that has just been released called Rick and Bubba’s Guide to the Almost Nearly Perfect Marriage. They made some great points on the show about being married and for those of you who listen to them in the mornings, you’ve heard some of their marriage/family stories.
Anyway, it got me to thinking about how marriage is often portrayed in such a negative light in the media and by so many people who mock and make fun of married life. I disagree with those assessments! I love marriage. I love my wife. I can’t imagine being single again and would never want to. Speaking of being single again, I’ve been there. Getting back into the whole dating thing, which I was never any good at in the first place, after being married really stunk. I remember one of the first times I actually called and asked someone out on a date. I had been assured by the girl’s sister that she was interested in going out with me and that she would say yes. I was still scared. So, I psyched myself up to call her one night. But, before I did, I spent an hour making a list of things to talk about should the conversation need a boost. She did say yes but I thought I might collapse from the sheer nervousness. It wore me out. I enjoyed the date but feeling like you are always having to impress someone can be draining. Especially when you’re me!

I met Gigi in November of 1995. I popped the question the following fall and we married on June 14, 1997. On a side note, she didn’t actually say yes when I asked her. Her immediate response was, “Are you serious?” She finally did say yes, though. With all the bumps and bruises and ups and downs, it has been the best 12 years of my life. Our marriage isn’t perfect. Whose is? Show me two people who say they have the perfect marriage and I’ll show you two big, fat liars! We do our share of arguing and being angry but you’ll never hear me tell someone how horrible married life is. I love it! It’s plenty exciting for me and there is not a single thing from my single life that I miss.

I suppose, like anything else, it is what you make it. You get out of it what you put into it. If you want to be miserable and continue living your life the way you want to with no regard for anyone else, then maybe marriage isn’t for you. It takes effort and patience and commitment to get through the rough spots and make it work but when you get past that rough spot…hey #1! I’m not saying that being single is bad. God calls some to singleness and the single life can be a fulfilling one. But to listen to your average person, marriage is one difficulty after another and is to be avoided at all costs. I disagree wholeheartedly.

Gigi and I were in a pretty good argument a few years ago before we had children. I don’t even remember what it was about. During the course of the evening’s events, I spilled a large fountain drink that had been sitting on the counter between the two of us. I went to the bedroom to change clothes and then, with only a pair of shorts on, came back to the kitchen to continue the festivities. As I said what I needed to say, I again headed towards the back, secure in my victory. Deciding I needed to say one more thing, I abruptly stopped. Or should I say, attempted to stop? My feet hit the puddle of spilled soda and in a flash, I was laying on the floor. I’ve never seen anyone go from standing straight up to being flat on the floor that quickly in my life. There was silence for a few moments. My hip hurt. I wanted to be angry and somehow blame Gigi. Then I heard the muffled sound of laughter. Then the loud sound of laughter. Then lots of laughter. And with that, the fight was over and a memory was made. YAY, MARRIAGE!!!

Marriage is good and I’ll fight the guy who says otherwise! Not really, though, because I don’t want to get beat up. But it is good!

Oh, and Happy Anniversary on the 14th, Gigi! I love you!

First, let me say that the following thoughts and opinions have absolutely nothing to do with race(how sad that I feel I needed to mention that).

I have a question. Is anyone who voted for Barack Obama having second thoughts about it? I can honestly say, and have said before, that I was no fan of President Bush by the time he left office. I was not fond of the way he dealt with the war, the economy, and various other issues. My ideals are not tied to any candidate or political party and when the leaders I supported stray from those ideals, I no longer support them. I have yet to hear from an Obama supporter who disagrees with anything he has done or is trying to do. Has this modern day pied piper’s song turned them into nothing more than blind followers who can’t or won’t think for themselves?

Does anyone honestly think it is a good thing that the government actually fired the CEO of General Motors, Rick Wagoner, by threatening to withhold stimulus funds from the company unless he quit? How many times in history has that happened?

How about the fact that a large percentage of the GM dealership closings appear to be at least partially politically motivated? It looks like several of these GM dealers were actually quite profitable but made the mistake of supporting Republican candidates rather than those in the party of our current administration. Now their livelihoods have been taken away from them.

Do those who support Obama actually think it is possible for the big, fat, bloated, power-hungry, federal government that can’t manage its own business, to manage GM’s? Or AIG’s? Or any number of bailed out financial institutions? Or the health system? Or anything else for that matter?

What this administration is doing shouldn’t surprise anyone. It is exactly what should be expected of an extreme left-wing liberal with a socialist agenda. What is surprising is that so many people are drinking the Obama-berry Kool-Aid. Otherwise right-thinking, reasonable people are being led down the primrose path to socialism and skipping and whistling all the way!

I am 40 years old. Never in those 40 years have I been too terribly afraid of what the future holds for our country. I’ve always thought that the American people had far too much common sense to ever be fooled by a slick-talking community organizer. That our way of governing would never allow us to be taken to a place that history has shown is good for those in power but devastating for the common man. Now that appears to be a very real possibility in my lifetime. And if things don’t change it scares me to think what kind of country my two children will live in when they are older. Will they be able to work and worship and travel and raise families as they see fit? Or will the government dictate all that and more to them? San Diego County officials just last week told a pastor that he couldn’t hold Bible studies in his own home. Granted, the county has backed off somewhat but the fact that the government attempted to prohibit American citizens the right to worship in their own home in the first place should frighten anyone! It’s a very sobering thought to think how much worse things could get in the coming years.

Some will say my fears are unfounded. That all this president wants to do is make us more prosperous. A noble idea to be sure. Unfortunately, if he has his way, it will likely come at the expense of some of the most basic freedoms we enjoy as a free, capitalistic society. I would love to hear from some of you who supported and continue to support this president and his ideology. Perhaps I’m simply not intelligent enough nor forward-thinking enough to see how the direction in which we are going is good for this country and you could explain it to me in terms a simpleton can understand. Because right now, I don’t.

By: Kimberly Hays

My confession this week: I completely scrapped the original blog post I wrote because of something I heard on NPR this morning. You will get to read the original sometime soon, but I thought this was too important to pass up. As I was getting ready for church this morning in my safe home, putting on my pretty dress, and blow drying my hair from a nice warm shower I hear Liane Hansen on Morning edition say that “1/3 of women in Sudan and Sudanese refugee camps have been the victim of rape”. I was absolutely stunned. There are 3 women in my family. Based on those statistics one of us would have been raped and probably long before now. According the FBI crime statistics for 2007, 90,427 forcible rapes in the United States were reported or 59 rapes per 100,000 women (http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2007/offenses/violent_crime/forcible_rape.html).

Some groups estimate that approximately 80% of sexual assaults in the United States are not reported and 1 out of 3 (sound familiar?) women in the U.S. will be sexually assaulted at some time in her life. While the numbers reported for Sudanese women were shocking I was even more appalled at my own thinking. Why do the rapes occurring on another continent appall me, but I am often not fazed by the news stories I see from Montgomery, Oklahoma City, and even sometimes Stillwater. Why am I not enraged for these women who have had their lives changed forever? How can I be prepared to donate or buy a t-shirt for these Sudanese women, but not bat an eye at the trauma that is occurring in my own hometown? Maybe because I know that in the United States women can walk into an emergency room and receive treatment for the physical and emotional effects of rape. Or maybe it is because often (but sadly not all the time) when a woman is raped in the United States she is not completely shunned by her family and community. Maybe it is because that in the United States there is a chance that a rapist may be prosecuted for their crimes.

But what about our sisters, our mothers, and our daughters that are sexually assaulted in their lifetimes, but never say a word. They carry a burden on their shoulders that is just as heavy as the burden of the Sudanese women living in a refugee camp in Chad. Their lives are literally and figuratively worlds apart, but the burdens they share are more similar than many of us realize. I didn’t write this column to make any deep dark confessions about my own life. Thank goodness I am not a statistic, but many of my friends are. Smart, strong, beautiful women that were sexually assaulted by family members, acquaintances or complete strangers. Some are reported statistics and others are not. I think the reason that I scrapped my original column for this was with hope that you would ask the questions that I am asking of myself. Am I so focused on my little sphere of the world that I ignore the suffering occurring down the street or around the world? Am I afraid to think about the hard, uncomfortable stuff? Can I make any difference at all?

The only one of these questions that I can answer for any of you is the final one. Absolutely you can make a difference. No, this doesn’t mean traveling halfway around the world or donating money to a cause (although it would be awesome if it did). It means recognizing what is going on in your world (the small version and the big version) and not ignoring it with hopes that it will just go away. Parents talk to your children about the hard stuff and answer their questions. Don’t scare them, but let them know how special they are and that everyone deserves to be treated equally as special whether they live in Wetumpka, Alabama or in Khartoum, Sudan. Fellas, walk that lady to her car when it is dark out. Ladies, be aware of your surroundings and take steps to protect yourself. Mostly, think big and think small. As different as our lives are from those Sudanese women in this case the pain is the same. Help a woman here. Love a woman here and that can be felt around the world.

Based on the statistics I presented above some of you readers may be affected by this issue. Please ask for help.
The Rape Crisis Center http://rapecrisis.com/
Council Against Rape Crisis Line, Montgomery (AL) 334-286-5987
Stillwater (OK) Domestic Violence 405-624-3020