Those Important Days

You know, one of the worst things you can do as a husband, is to forget an important day in your life together. What do I mean by that? I’m talking about days like her birthday and your anniversary. Even if those types of days aren’t important to you, they probably are to your wife. So, the last thing you want to do is skip over one of them without the necessary gifts, cards, and special meal.

Fortunately for modern man, we’ve got all sorts of things that can remind us of those days. Lots of us use some sort of electronic PIM, such as a Palm, or iPad, or even Outlook on our computer. So, all we’ve got to do is program her birthday and our anniversary into those right?

Wait a minute, let’s say that you go ahead and program those days into Outlook on your home computer. You probably don’t have time to check your computer before heading off to work, so you don’t see that great reminder until you come home. Oops, it’s already too late. You may as well grab a blanket and pillow and head out to the dog house, because that’s where you’re going to be sleeping for the next couple of weeks.

Or, let’s say that you’ve got it programmed into your PIM, and it tells you about her birthday in the morning. Okay, now you’ve got all day to do something about it. Only, you end up with the busiest day you’ve ever had in the office, and there’s a critical meeting that runs over, meaning you don’t get to leave on time. So, you dash home, grabbing a dozen roses along the way, to find your wife miffed at you and not too happy about your wilted roses.

Celebrating an important day takes some time to prepare. So, why not make a little adjustment to your electronic calendar? Go ahead and leave your wife’s birthday and your anniversary in there, but program daily reminders in for the 3 days or more beforehand. That way, you’ll get reminders in time to plan something and buy your wife a nice gift.

Let me say one other thing here. Invariably there are times when it is impossible to celebrate an important day on that day. This year, my wife and I couldn’t go out for Valentine’s Day, because we were both teaching that night. So, what do you do for those problem times? Easy, celebrate it early. Take your wife out the day before, or on the weekend before, instead of on the day in question. Just make sure you let her know ahead of time, that that’s what you are doing. Waiting till afterwards says you forgot, doing it beforehand says you’re giving her priority.

One other little note: going hunting, fishing, or to your bowling league on your wife’s birthday is a real no-no. Even if you take her out to the fanciest restaurant ahead of time and buy her a gorgeous gift, you’re still sending the message, “my hunting is more important than you are.”