As Christmas rapidly approaches I am reminded of those long Christmas Eve’s of trying to assemble various bikes, trikes, hot wheels and any number of other toys or small furnishings for my little tikes after they had all gone off to bed. Of course like most Dads I never even glanced at the instructions until all else had failed. After all, how hard could it possibly be to put together something when you have a picture of it right there on the box and supposedly all you are going to need is a screwdriver and a hammer! They never seem to mention that you will also need the patience of Job. Anyway, I mean, I built houses for a living! So how hard can this be?

 

Besides, our wives have all looked at these things in the store when they bought them and they had every confidence that it would “take no time at all” and would just be a snap to just snap these devilish contraptions together. And so the pressure is on…

 

In putting together these ‘toys’, we have all probably noticed how these “simple” directions have changed over the years. What was once just a written log of step by step detailed instructions that even I could follow have now become a catalog of fuzzy little pictures vaguely displaying how Part A connects to Part B and so on. But it is only later when things are not going very well wherein we discover that we were supposed to attach Part E onto Part D before we had slipped Part C into Part D! Upon further investigation we find that not only is there a Part A but there is also a very similar Part A1, which of course we have used almost to completion instead of Part A.

 

Sometimes printed under these fuzzy little cartoons are what is now deemed “the instructions” in such small print that you find you also need a magnifying glass along with the screwdriver and hammer. Apparently these manufacturers are also now paying by the word because these instructions usually now read, “Using Screw G attach A to B.” Huh uh.

 

It also never helps that they try to differentiate the sizes of the various screws or bolts with a diagram that is nowhere close to scale in that everything in the picture looks exactly the same. Apparently whoever draws these things up sees little difference between a half-inch screw and a three-inch screw, and you just know that these screw length graph designers can’t all be women with lying boyfriends. 

 

Likewise depending on where all these products are sold or where all they come from, we may have as many as five or six different languages to shuffle through. I have often wondered if a foreign manufacturer wasn’t being a bit more specific in their details in another language other than English, you know, maybe just for a little payback for once defeating their nation in a war, or perhaps an Olympic event. 

 

Many of these instructions will also include a toll free phone number where you can reach the company that manufactured this toy from hell if you run into any problems. As it is usually two o’clock in the morning, on Christmas Day, when you need this “Help” then you already have more than one problem if you want to call this company for that help.

 

However since this number connects you to a room full of Hindus in India, where it is about two o’clock in the afternoon, they will answer your call with, “Hallo, my num iz George Clooney, hows may I halp you?”

 

At that time half way around the world five or six of these ‘helpful’ chaps will gather around ‘George’ and laugh their turbans off while giving you the business for being stupid enough for giving them your business.

 

Of course after you have hung up in frustration, and just about the time you are screaming, “Merry blankin’ Christmas!” as you kick the hot wheels’ box with that taunting, aggravating picture of the completed product across the garage, those madcap sadistic fellas in that New Delhi help center will all be discussing just how funny you were. In their discussion they will all be using perfect English, which they learned at the University.

 

Oh I know that wasn’t politically correct but you all know those guys are just having a great old time whenever a call comes in from the good old USA.

 

Meanwhile you are sitting on the floor of your garage, sleepless, frustrated and irritated looking at a pile of eighty-dollar plastic junk as you absentmindedly, and not so lightly, tap your forehead with the hammer. Since you have not been able to find any further reference in the directions about this hammer, you are somewhat pleased with yourself for finally finding a use for it. You have also come to the conclusion as you sit there cussing the designers of this ‘toy’ that you would rather have a sister who was a prostitute than a brother who was an engineer, or on a personal note as homebuilder, an architect.

 

But alas, we Fathers generally do get the job done, one way or another, and usually just about the time the kids come bounding down the stairs looking for Santa who’s still out in the garage now soaking with sweat, because none of us want to see our kids’ faces when we hand them half a dozen unassembled pieces of various colored plastic and say, “Merry Christmas, Honey.” Especially when we have spent about eighty bucks on it.

 

So what if a wheel falls off a week later, that’s why we also bought the kid a helmet. Of course at this time you will also discover why you needed the hammer.

 

Regardless of the troubles we may have in assembling these oversized plastic puzzles, or the lack of adequate details in the directions, many times what it all comes down to is that I simply needed to listen to my wise old Father when he had told me, “When all else fails, read the directions.”

Of course in my entire life with him, I never saw my Father read any directions either.

 

This simple and true lesson of reading the directions first is taught to fathers all over the world every Christmas, and on the eve of their kids’ birthdays. Well actually I should say that all fathers are reeducated in this lesson every time.

 

You see, the trouble arises in that Christmas and a kid’s birthday only come around once a year, and as every woman will happily point out, we of the male species have a decidedly annoying handicap of forgetting things. Not to mention a certain little machismo wherein we think we can do, or build, anything simply by watching it being done or by looking at it. We can’t help it really, as both this forgetfulness and macho attitude are embedded into our nature, if not indeed, into our spinal columns.

 

So us men will walk all around something mumbling incoherently to ourselves and then finally exclaim, “Ugh, me can build,” as we throw the directions off to the side.

 

This manly but unfortunate combination of machismo and forgetfulness can lead to some very complicated and dangerous behavior. Such as the machismo not allowing the male to use his better judgment on one summer’s evening when faced with five to two odds against his favor in the parking lot of the Paradise Theater, which resulted in some unfavorable consequences for the two.

 

Meanwhile, a few years later the forgetfulness of that experience resulted in that male’s machismo once again not allowing that male to use his better judgment when confronted with three to one odds against his favor on a cool June evening on Myrtle Beach. With his reasoning being that while there was now only one on his side instead of two there were only three on their side instead of five.

 

Besides, this male had also more than once watched Chuck Norris clear out entire barrooms single-handed. And so it happened that with those inspiring macho images of Chuck easily cleaning house, along with his own unrelenting machismo, combined with his total forgetfulness of the prior encounter’s results, and further emboldened by his consumption of a few too many beers, that enabled this male to confidently assume, “Ugh, me can do this.”

 

While both of these instances may not have been all that fun, they were at the least interesting and educational. For my wise old Father had also told me, “Never go looking for trouble but don’t run from it either.” So while I had not been looking for trouble on either of these occasions, I simply followed his directions and didn’t run. The trouble is he never specified what I should do when the ‘trouble’ was multiplied, but then in knowing my old man, that probably never mattered. 

 

As you can see, this machismo combined with this male forgetfulness can often result in a vicious and sometimes painful cycle, or four long hours to assemble one, single, simple godforsaken little toy!

 

Meanwhile I have every confidence that women, who usually lack this machismo and forgetfulness, unless they ride Harleys and call each other Butch, can actually assemble these toys faster than men can, and here’s why.

 

Women will read, study, and reread the directions while even making notes, and some will even take it over to Kinko’s to make extra copies just in case they are needed, before they will eventually look up at their mates to ask, “Okay, I got it, so what’s a screwdriver look like?” 

 

I believe, and please Ladies, I mean this as a compliment so please don’t start looking for a frying pan to launch in my direction. But I believe that women learn that it is always necessary to read the directions before getting started on anything because they learned to read recipes at a very early age. Just as they know that when traveling in unfamiliar locations its nice to look at a map once in a while. But I should now point out in our defense that while men could look at the same map our machismo runs all of the lines and stuff together so what we are actually looking at is just one big blur, we just don’t want to tell our co-pilots this as they wouldn’t understand anyway. The same goes for asking for directions. In such cases our machismo turns common everyday English into some incoherent form of an ancient Swahili dialect. So you see it just isn’t our fault, it’s all because of our spines.

 

Anyway, because women know how to follow recipes they naturally know how to follow toy assembly directions. And that’s a good thing because if they didn’t follow these recipes to the letter, well, that could be fatal.

 

On the other hand, have you ever watched a man follow a recipe? And no I’m not talking about some guy named Wolfgang. I’m talking about everyday average Joes like you and me. For one thing, just like those screw graph designers who don’t have a clue to the difference between a half-inch screw and a three-inch screw, men have absolutely no idea what in the world is meant by “a pinch of salt!” Men all know what we like to pinch and it isn’t salt. Meanwhile guys named Wolfgang would probably rather pinch each other.

 

Furthermore, women never forget anything. Nothing, NOTA, zilch, zip and so on. And I mean everything that women have ever said, been told, read, overheard, saw or even imagined, they remember it all, but only when they want to.

 

So while Mom was in the kitchen showing the girls how to faithfully follow recipes so nobody would get sick. Dad was out in the garage with his boys kicking boxes. 

 

Still every year men are required to assemble these toys even though we have to admit that women could do it faster and easier by following the directions. But then there is a reason for that too. While the men are freezing out in the garage cursing and going crazy looking for that last three inch Phillips screw that was just here a moment ago! The women are snug inside singing Christmas carols while listening to Elvis’ Blue Christmas album and sipping spiked eggnog as they joyously wrap the presents.

 

But if you have ever seen a man who wasn’t named Wolfgang or Felix try to wrap a present you will understand this division of labor. You may even hear some words you have never heard before.

 

When you give a man a screwdriver and a hammer, at least he is still in his own little manly man world, even if he is just spinning his wheels. But give a guy a pair of scissors, some Scotch tape and some fancy silk paper with cute little snowflakes, elves and such, he will become confused, paranoid or extremely frustrated and well, you might as well just have him neutered.

 

Besides a man’s idea of a good wrap job is placing the gift in a fancy sack, or a plastic bag if the fancy sack is unavailable. If a man does try to use wrapping paper the end results usually looks like a blind, epileptic completed the task while in the middle of a severe sneezing attack. Either that or it will take three men and a boy, a good reliable pick-up truck and two chainsaws to unwrap his masterpiece of duck taped ingenuity.

 

Yet it is not as though men cannot learn to remember things like reading the directions first. It is just that for men this learning process takes time, like years and years of time. Women call this male learning process, “Training.” Men refer to it as their last days of independent thought.

 

But this is why you will often see young men forget anniversaries or birthdays, even their own, but you will never see a man forget his fortieth anniversary, his tenth or maybe even his twentieth, but nothing after that. And we have the bumps, bruises and scars to back up this hypothesize don’t we guys. 

 

This learning process, or training is why I never saw my father read any directions but when I was older with kids of my own and had grown frustrated in assembling these toys, he would constantly tell me, “When all else fails, read the directions.”

 

To which I would reply, “Ugh, me can build.”

 

You see he had finally learned what I would finally learn years later, to always read the directions first. The trouble is that all of us men have to go through the years and years of the learning process first. By doing so we finally learn to read the directions at about the same time that our kids are too old for toys that need assembly.

 

It is a generational curse as I now stand by quietly watching my son assemble tricycles and hot wheels for my granddaughter until he is about to blow a gasket when I will finally interject my wisdom of, “When all else fails, read the directions.”

 

To which the young father replies, “Ugh, me can build.”

 

 

Now if this simple lesson only pertained to the assembly of toys or in following cooking recipes, we would be done here. Unfortunately this lesson of discarding our “instructions” has far more serious repercussions in our society.

 

Nothing we do, buy or use comes without its own little book of directions. Call them laws, rules, regulations, instructions, directions or morality, these guidelines are important in directing us in how we should properly conduct ourselves and to successfully accomplish our goals. 

 

In our predominately Christian/Judeo society our main set of “instructions” are The Ten Commandments, which as we are shamefully witnessing are being shoved underground. While we may still speak of these Ten directives, nowhere in public may they be displayed as they might offend others who do not share our beliefs.

 

Our second most important set of directions is our Constitution. It is really quite a simple and straightforward document that instructs our Federal government in what they can and cannot do. Yet our society has allowed our elected officials to literally wad up this sacred document into a ball and throw it into the corner wastebasket.  

 

How on earth did it ever become conceivable that corporations like AIG and GM were too big to fail and that they must be saved even at the risk of the success of our very own Nation and of our Freedoms?

 

Where did we ever get the idea that the Federal government should be allowed to take over banks, corporations, mortgage companies and our health care in spite of the Constitution?

 

Where in our Constitutional directions does it state that it is up to the Federal government to make sure that every American is provided for and that others must pay for those provisions?

 

Where does the Constitution instruct our government to assign every person on earth, regardless of his or her nationality, or crimes, or illegal immigration status, the same Constitutional Rights and benefits of an American citizen?

 

I wonder; would we stand by as Iran, Mexico, North Korea, Russia or China insisted that all the World’s citizens must be regarded as the same as the citizens of their States and where to be held to the same laws and given, or refused, the same rights as they see fit?

 

Where in our Constitution does it give a blank check to the Federal government to continue to run up a deficit? Where does it say that they can continue spending money that they do not have? Where does it say that they can send you or I to jail if we do not buy something they want us to buy? Where does it say that this government can send taxpayers’ dollars anywhere in the world without the taxpayers’ consent? This list of questions goes on and on yet we get no answers from this corrupt, rogue government as they continue to feed our Constitution, our Liberties, and our Rights and Freedoms into the shredder.

 

Almost everything the Federal government has done in the past year has been unconstitutional. From the bailouts, to cash for clunkers, from taking over GM and Chrysler to setting salaries and wages of corporation employees and the firing employees, from the stimulus bill to the pork in the Omnibus bill, from voting on an unconstitutional health care bill to granting US citizens’ legal rights to terrorists and trying them in a civilian court, from subsidizing politically active community organizations with tax dollars to usurping the census into the control of the White House.

 

The Constitution is written in plain English and has not changed in meaning for over 233 years. There are no fuzzy little cartoons to follow nor do you need a magnifying glass to read the small print. You don't need a screwdriver or a hammer and sickle. Yet our government is trying to assemble our Nation as they now see fit by throwing away the directions prescribed in our Constitution.

 

So to “Mom” Pelosi and Uncle Harry who want t give the American People socialized government health care for Christmas, I say keep your lousy gift and instead try reading the directions. For when all else fails, and it has, read the directions and in the matters of running our Nation, that would be The Constitution. Follow these directions firmly. It is not up to these scoundrels to interpret what the Founding Fathers may have meant or will perhaps allow them to get away with.

 

Do this simple thing, or as God is our Witness, we will find those who will follow the directions set by our Constitution.

 

God Bless America

 

 

Semper Fi,

Mike

 

 

 

"Copyright 2009.  Michael E. Tank   All rights reserved. No part of this document may be copied, faxed, electronically transmitted, or in any other manner duplicated without express written permission of the author.”