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My middle child, my son Henry, recently found an online source that said being grumpy is not as bad for your health as people think it is.  Bless his little black heart… everything on the internet is true, right?  But if it is true, it could be of benefit to me.  Mickey is not the only other me.  There is also grumpy old Mike.

I recently wrote a poem about being grumpy.  A grumpy poet?  That could be a thing, right?  Here is what that poem looked like;

Grumpy (a poem about Grumpy life)

Dang it, you old grumpy man!

You annoy me as only a grumpy man can.

You grouse and growl and sometimes howl,

And pace the house like a cat on the prowl.

You worry me, weary me, and generally nasty be,

And of course you are… yes, you are… naturally me.

So why do you worry me, weary me, moan and make bother,

Now that you’re old, and you sound like your father?

Because you are cranky now, creaky with age,

And know you now, soon, the book’s turning its page.

And, though you complain, you do love your life,

And, loathe you will leave it, and your sweet-smiling wife.

Yes, I come by grumpiness naturally.  It is a function of constant, nagging pain from arthritis and constant struggles with low blood sugar from diabetes.  And things go so wonderfully well all the time…

Like yesterday.  It was the first day after winter break, and so, since I hadn’t heard otherwise, I thought the kids had school.  And they go to two different schools at two different times.  So, I got up and cooked bacon for breakfast.  Wife and daughter both ate happily and only complained a little bit that the bacon was too burnt and the hash browns apparently got freezer burn in the freezer.  Then wife reminded me to check to be sure Henry actually had school before I took him.  She got in her car and took off for the school where she teaches.  Then, daughter and I got into the car and I dropped her off at her middle school.  Mere minutes later she called me on her new cell phone and told me that it was a teacher work day and no school for her after all.  So, I picked her up again.  So, grumbling and rumbling only a little bit, because why didn’t wifey tell me it was a work day only?  And then I checked on Henry’s school website.  Their last day of vacation was listed as Friday, January 1st.  That meant they did have school, right?  So I drove him all the way there in Lewisville.  There was only one other student there.  And the door was locked.  Then a principal told Henry that it wasn’t a class day.  Why couldn’t they have posted it on their screwy @#$%! website.  So, I went home again with the boy, and consoled myself that at least we did not have to do the afternoon pick-me-up-from-school tango with DFW area traffic.

This morning my wife got a good laugh at my expense.  After complaining about the slightly burnt sausages I made, I was told in no uncertain terms that I should be humble about making mistakes and not get mad when people laugh at my follies.  That was not fire coming out of my ears.  Honest, it was not.  I put on a happy grin.  But I was told it was a sarcastic smile at best, and I should stop it.  So I stopped it.  I probably won’t smile again today.  I bought a chocolate doughnut from QT, and I wrote about grumpiness as I ate it.  It helped.  I tried to find my son’s article about the health benefits of grumpiness, but, failing that, I found this article;

http://goodlifezen.com/17-sure-fire-ways-to-overcome-grumpiness/

So grumpy old Mike needs to go away now, and leave me alone.  Better days are coming.  And today the kids really are in school.