How I give back/Advice that works – One way to save your sanity when spouse or children annoy

Sometimes, when I get annoyed or angry, Husband will walk me over to a picture from his brother’s bar mitzvah. This is an old picture, circa 1970. Husband points at a little boy who’s wearing a brown suit, no more than two years of age, standing in front of the crowd. The toddler’s chocolate brown eyes are filled with equal parts love and mischief. He looks remarkably familiar.

Husband will point at this adorable little boy and say, “Now, how can you be mad at him?”

Nine times out of ten, it works. I drop the rather large kitchen knife, smile and immediately forget I had just fallen ass-first into the toilet because the bastard who once wore brown suits likes to leave the seat up.

This strategy works with children, too.

If you have a picture or home video of your children before they became obnoxious and opinionated, keep it handy. The next time one of your little angels leaves boiled eggs in his lunch box during spring break and then complains about the “stink” coming from your pantry or the next time your gifted prodigy leaves her bedroom window open during a near-hurricane and nearly floods half of the house, take out their video or picture as a reminder that, at one point, you actually liked your kids.

It works for me.

See? How can I be mad at such cute kids? Loud, but cute.

You might wonder what my boys, all three of them, gaze at lovingly when I do something annoying. The short answer is that I hardly ever annoy.

Seriously.

I’m a goddamn delight.

Which is a good thing, because I can’t find many pictures from my youth where I’m not angry and scowling at the camera. Forget about my teenage years. Those out-of-control curls or bad lighting or unfortunate wardrobe choices do not encourage adoration.

Video? My stock footage is even worse. Check out this clip, taken from my Studio 10 appearance last week.

Speaking of out-of-control curls and bad lighting. The only positive is that my hate mail now contains styling suggestions and tanning-cream coupons.

Good thing I always lower the toilet seat and bedroom windows, right?