Taking Out The Pacifier Long Enough To Shave

....or taking out the pacifier long enough to put on lipstick. It can go both ways. What would that be? Those who have no business getting married much less even trying to date someone under the guise of trying to get married.

It is a pet peeve of mine, not only because I have children who will eventually wish to be married themselves but I see things in my profession where I cringe thinking of the other person that will have to put up with the behavior of another just because a parent refused to do their job or have the cinchonas to stop babying the baby of the family.

It reminds me of an episode on a sitcom that has since been cancelled. It was called, Just Shoot Me starring Laura San Giacomo (Mia), George Segal (Jack), Wendie Malick (Nina), Enrico Colantoni (Elliot), and David Spade (Finch). In one of the episodes, Elliot had this brother Donnie, played by David Cross, who deliberately acted as if he had this fatal injury causing him to have mental challenges like growing up and being responsible. He blamed his brother for throwing a Frisbee too high in a tree which caused him to fall out of a tree when he tried to retrieve it. He kept this act up because his parents wished for him to go right to work once he graduated high school and he didn't want to. Mia and Elliot are coworkers and was coming to see his family for the first time. Donnie was smitten by Mia and decided to come clean to her so they could date or at the least fool around. The part that was particularly memorable for me was when Jack kept trying to explain a theory of his to Donnie. Donnie, having grown and developed like a normal man, could no longer keep pretending and had to be himself which also revealed what he had been doing for so many years.

Though this is something that has been made fun of here, in real life, its anything but funny. Men have to realize that no woman wishes to take care of children for the rest of their lives. No one wishes to marry someone who has no intentions of doing for themselves (Proverbs 17:25 AMP). Even a man who hopes to rescue a damsel in distress eventually wishes for the damsel not to be distressed anymore. Can a distressed damsel ever have children, manage a household, help her husband? How, when she never learned how to problem solve?

An 80 year old woman was looking for an apartment complex for her and her son. He had some issues though. He liked to drink and had more then a few DUI's and wasn't looking for any means to get off of the booze. This kept him from keeping a job and doing any normal things a man his age could do. Stuff like, getting an education, marry, have children, a pension, or a good outlook on his future. By the way, the man was over 60. He blamed the world for all of his problems and his mother pacified him by resolving what she could. When this woman's daughter heard that her mother was going to be homeless unless she did something quick, the daughter told her mother to come and reside with her. The daughter lived in another part of the country and this meant a big move. As the son was getting ready to move too, the daughter made it clear that the invitation did not include her brother. Now the elderly woman had a decision to make. Was she going to be homeless with her son or was she going to allow her son to be the man he needs to be? Can you imagine the fear of this man having to be on his own for the first time and actually be independent at 60 (Proverbs 29:15 AMP)?

I wrote about a man who was in the church and was single his whole life then announcing at 70 some odd years old that he was finally ready to be married. He made the announcement because he saw a woman in the church that was about his age, still attractive and had means of her own. The woman heard the announcement and winced. She was not interested at all. She had been married before and her husband loved her before he passed away. She knew what love looked like and could not see that in this man ready to be just that - responsible and grown. It wasn't too long before the elderly man also passed away single and alone.

The bottom line is, its not normal. It isn't what God intended. Whether its the parent afraid to be alone and the empty nest is too much to take on or the child not wanting to grow up and be the responsible adult that he/she is supposed to be....something is going to give. Water that doesn't move stinks. A tree that doesn't produce fruit will be bundled with the weeds to be burned. There has to be increase. There has to be some sort of production, some idea coming into being, some creation that will make it a better place for someone else. Its the purpose of people being on the planet. Remember, Jesus cursed the fig tree all the way to the root.