Ma Widge

Don’t you just love Ma Widge in the retro Princess Bride movie?!  I do!

I have been with Ma Widge for almost 50 years now!  It has been quite an experience!!

There is a special secret that I’d like to tell you about Ma Widge. First I’ll tell the story, then I’ll tell the secret. Maybe you’ll get it before the end of the story?

My dear husband had a career as a turbo-prop captain for an airline for almost 30 years. He would fly into an airport and there would be these guys with fluorescent jackets and light sabers waving their arms in secret codes that told him exactly where to park and when to stop. Well, somehow, this work situation came home to roost in our family. When we moved to our new house my husband says to me, “Your car is parked in the carport wrong and I can’t get past to the garage.”  So I heard this and the next time I parked my car I made sure I was giving room to walk past to the garage. A while goes by and my husband says to me, “Your car is parked in the carport wrong and I don’t have room to wheel the wood.”  So I patiently parked different the next time I drove in the carport.  Another while goes by and my husband says to me, “Your car is parked too far to the left and the door is going to hit the side of the carport.” Again I moved it. Then it was too close to his car. Then it was too far forward and the sprinklers would hit it. This went on a long time, at least a year or so. I consider myself a fairly patient wife however every statement got me a little hotter under the collar. Each reply of mine was a little louder, more sharp and edgy. My husband’s responses were matched to mine because apparently I wasn’t listening or doing what he was asking. Then finally, came the last straw concerning where the car was parked and the ‘ol wifey blew up bigtime! She exploded with tantrum-like shouts and vicious come-backs. “I give up! I have tried and tried to park the stupid car where you want it and I cannot do it. And you—you don’t even lift a finger to help me to let me know where to park it! Draw me a line. Give me a place. Help me for crying out loud!!” So my husband, just as angry and offended, stomped out to the garage, hung a string with a leather circle on the bottom. He placed the string to be exactly in the middle of my steering wheel and just a kiss-touch on the windshield. Voila! The next time I drove in to the carport I put the car exactly in that spot.  And there was peace for Ma Widge for the rest of life about parking the car. Never even mentioned again.

Do you know what the Ma Widge secret is?  Did you guess? Well, I will tell you what I learned.

Many of Ma Widge’s angry issues are purely administrative and can be solved administratively.

So I say, if you are having provoking issues of Ma Widge, before you scream at each other or go to a counselor, see if there are easy administrative solutions? Ask your administrative friends? Or, better yet, ask Holy Spirit to give you an administrative solution. He may give it to you in a dream. Einstein’s theory of relativity came that way. Holy Spirit is very smart.