Wooden Spoon Wisdom.

I have a younger sister, and so there were two things that my mother felt a need to remind me of many times while we were growing up. The first was to "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." She called it the Golden Rule. “Do unto others…” No one really talks like that, which made the rule sound so important. And plus, it was a gold-plated rule, which was way too fancy to mess with.

The second thing she told me was, “If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.” This one didn’t sound quite as fancy as the other rule, but she really, really meant it. If I were even thinking of saying something that wasn’t nice, she could tell. Her eyes narrowed, her mouth set in a straight line, and she gave me that Clint Eastwood look as if to ask, “Do you feel lucky, punk?” If I were smart, I would have completely forgotten that I had anything to say whatsoever. If I wasn’t smart, let’s just say I wouldn’t be sitting comfortably for a while.

She used a wooden spoon for those times when I wasn’t being smart enough to follow these two rules. Although there were those times when she used the wooden spoon after saying, “Don’t you get smart with me!” So, you really have to be careful just how smart you are in these situations. Be smart enough to be nice to your sister, but if you mess that up, you need to get dumb really quick. If you’re too smart after not being smart, you’ll get the spoon.

I learned that I wasn’t going to be smart enough to be nice to my sister all the time, so I hid my mother’s wooden spoons instead. When she couldn’t find a spoon, she used a ping pong paddle. Over the years, I eventually hid every ping pong paddle, back scratcher, slipper, and flip-flop in the house. It wasn’t until after I graduated high school, when we were moving the couch, that about two dozen wooden spoons and other spanking implements fell out of the sleeper mattress onto the floor. Each one represented a lesson learned the hard way.

My mother declared that “Do unto others” was the Golden Rule, and although my mother didn’t want us to say anything that wasn’t nice, today’s fortune is suggesting that keeping your mouth shut is the Golden Rule. So, which is it? Can there be more than one Golden Rule? Here’s what I propose: let’s just say that K.M.S. is an amendment to the Golden Rule, because staying silent when all you have to offer are insults or hurtful comments still puts you in wooden spoon territory. That way, you’ll be in compliance with today’s fortune as it answers the question, “Q. What is K.M.S.? A. Keep Mouth Shut, the golden rule.”