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Topic: Heroes (03/08/04)
TITLE: Oh my man of God By Dori Knight 03/12/04 |
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Why aliens would choose my driveway to land in out of the millions of driveways in the universe was beyond me, but it was obvious that they had, based on the piercing beep, beep, beeping of the mother ship outside of our bedroom window.
Or so I was thinking as I threw back the covers and prepared to jump out of my warm bed to save the children from having their brains sucked out. And I would have made it had a hand not shot out of the dark and grabbed me by the wrist, making me stop long enough to swallow my heart.
A gravelly voice that sounded suspiciously like my sleeping husband spoke into the darkness: “The weather conditions are right for a temperature inversion, causing the sound waves from the neighbor’s back up signal to bounce back into the atmosphere. It sounds like he’s in the driveway, but he’s really at least a half mile away.”
In some such situations, the husband would jump out of the bed, grab a nearby firearm, trip over the dog and stumble out the door in his long johns to kill him some aliens, and protect his woman.
My husband, on the other hand, explains away the aliens by spouting sound wave theorem from the comfort of his bed, without the benefit of a single drop of coffee. I could have eaten an entire field of raw coffee beans and still, my first thought still would have been the alien scenario.
My husband, you see, is a genius.
He is smart, he’s a great chef, a good provider, and he takes the children out to breakfast every Saturday morning so I can sleep late. What more could a woman want?
Of course, for all his intelligence, he is not perfect and has been known to blunder. There was that time when I was nine months pregnant and he managed to stick not one, but both of his feet into his mouth.
To be fair, there isn’t much that you can say to a five foot four inch woman carrying ten pounds of baby around that isn’t immediately going to tick her off. “You look beautiful today,” is liable to be met by “Today? Just today? What about yesterday? Oh, and I suppose nine months ago I was a real hag. Could you explain to me, then, just exactly how I got into this position if I am so incredibly hideous?”
My Sweet Baboo didn’t make the mistake of telling me how beautiful I was. Oh no, no. He made the mistake, while flipping through channels, of stopping for a Sumo wrestling match and joking “Oh look, honey . . . you’re on television.”
That was not one of our better days.
Still and all, I respect the man. Not because he is a certifiable genius. Not in spite of the fact that he can fit both of his feet in his mouth. I respect him because, for all of his perfections and imperfections, my husband is a man of God, and the Christ in him shines brilliantly through his life.
He is a man of honor, integrity, peace and faith. He is a man that I can look up to and learn from. He is a man that I respect enough to stand up for, and trust enough to follow. He is, in short, my hero.
Yes, there is a lot to be said for a man whose smile can make your knees weak; a lot to be said for a man who is willing to battle aliens for you in the middle of the night, or even one who can spout sound wave theorem in his sleep. There’s a lot to be said for a man who makes you sputter aloud, “Oh my goodness!”
But there is so more to be said for the man who, without saying a word, makes your soul quietly whisper “Oh my man of God.”
copyright 2004 doriknight