Humor

Excuse me, but I just gotta be me

by James Snyder 
02/27/16
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I refuse to answer for anybody else because it is a full-time job trying to answer for myself. I must confess, though, I sometimes cannot give a good answer for myself. I can give an answer, but not a good one, and when it comes to answers, the Gracious Mistress of the Parsonage demands good ones.

How do you explain yourself to someone when you cannot even explain yourself to yourself? I do not pretend to be a man of mystery, but many things about Yours Truly I certainly do not understand.

For one, I am not an actor. I want to make that very plain to all and sundry. Within the confines of my presence, are absolutely no acting skills.

I have some friends who are always acting like a fool. I am assuming they are acting and give them the benefit of the doubt. Another friend of mine at certain times acts dumb. I have known him for a very long time and I can usually tell when he is acting. By the way, he is a very good actor. Many of my friends are excellent actors and if they ever were competing for some Oscar or Emmy award, they would come pretty close to winning.

I am another story. It is very difficult for me in the area of acting. With me, what you see is what you get. I suppose when you boil it all down, I am just not smart enough to be a good actor. I am not even smart enough to be a bad actor.

Putting all of this in context, I must confess that my wife believes I am a great actor. I have tried to dissuade her from this opinion, but up to this point, I have not been successful. When she thinks of me she always says, “And the Emmy goes to…”

How she came to this point, I’m not quite sure. No matter what I do, she still holds to this personal opinion of me. I keep telling her that I am not that good of an actor, which she keeps smiling and nodding her head in my direction.

Some examples need to be given here to show my point.

Just the other night we were at a restaurant with some friends, having a good time, or so I thought. I must say when I’m on a roll, I’m on a roll. But all during my “roll,” I kept feeling somebody under the table kicking me. I ignored it thinking perhaps our friends did not quite know what they were doing. Never once did I suspicion my companion with this action. I kept rolling on.

Finally, both of them excused themselves to take a break and when they were out of hearing distance, my wife said to me, “Will you stop acting so foolish?”

I looked at her, not quite knowing what she was referring to, and said quite innocently, “But, my Precious, [it’s a name I use when I’m in trouble but don’t know why] I’m not acting.”

She gave me one of “those looks” and said, “Stop acting foolish.”

This is what I admire about my wife. She has the highest opinion of my abilities, particularly in the area of the thespian arts. Our friends were coming to the table when I was about to tell her I was not acting foolish, it just came natural.

Another example comes to mind.                                     

I remember she was trying to explain something to me one time. I do not know what it was now. It was something to do with something in the garage, a place I have not been for years, and I was not connecting the dots, as they say. She was going into a long dissertation on what needed to be done and I was just standing there staring at her. I was trying to understand what she was saying, but nothing was clicking upstairs, if you know what I mean.

In the middle of her dissertation, she stopped, looked at me intensely, placed both hands on her hips and said, “Don’t act so dumb.”

Smiling broadly, I whispered, “My Precious, I’m not acting.”

With a glare that could have intimidated good old Goliath, she quipped, “I’m coming to believe you’re right. You are not acting. You’re just naturally dumb.”

Somebody once sang a song called, “I gotta be me” which has become my theme song. What you see is what you get, when you are dealing with me. I am not smart enough to act and I am too old to play. Therefore, it all boils down to this one thing, I am what I am, like it or lump it.

I do not like it when people pretend to be something they are not. I want people to be real with me. This is doubly true with my relationship with God. He is honest with me and I want to be absolutely honest with him.

“If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?” (1 John 4:20).

Many people say they love God and yet it is all an act. It is easy to love somebody you cannot see but hard to love a brother right in front of you.