Honesty is the best policy.

No matter what happens or how things pan out, knowing you were up front and honest is always the best policy. You have to put it out there in order to insure that you are not wasting your time or giving people opportunities to warp or even steal away your goals. You have to be committed to "this is who I am and this is what I am about".

I've been asked out by a few girls in my life. Not bragging, just saying.

Not the kind of asking out where they meet you at a club or party and give you the "one night stand green light", but the old fashioned "can we go out sometime" kind of asking out. Being honest, the "green light" happened a few times too, but I normally passed on those types of relationships. Not always, but normally. I preferred more of a challenge, unless I was going through a dry patch and needed some attention, then I would take the easy route.

A real date. Remember those? After 17 years together and two kids, it's hard to imagine what a date would be like for my wife and me! We used to have them right? One thing is still true, even after being married for all these years, there is no guarantee I get to second base and I'll certainly be the one picking up the check. It we are out past 10pm, my chances for romance decrease exponentially by the minute!

There was this one time in college when a very cute girl asked me out and I said "yes". She was totally my type and I was pretty excited about the whole idea. We had a communications class together and I was going to ask her out, so she saved me the stress and awkward build up to the question. Sweet!

We had dinner and then grabbed some ice cream afterwards. Dinner conversation was good, but dessert gives you a few more minutes to make your move, but also a reminder that you are on the clock and you need to seal the deal of the next date or come up with a creative way of keeping the current one going. Remember in college, there was always a hidden meaning with the phrase "wanna go rent a movie"? Because if the ice cream conversation went well, you better know where the nearest Blockbuster was! A good date was determined by how little of the movie you actually watched, but you needed a reason to invite the girl back to your place.

Anyway, while eating ice cream, I asked her the one question that I asked most of the girls that I went out with in college.

"What do you want to accomplish before you leave this school".

Sadly, even on first dates, goals were important to me. If I was going to date this person, it was important to me that she was passionate about something.

The easy and traditional answers would be "get a degree" or "start my career", but this girl's answer is still burned into my brain now 20+ years later.

She said "God put me here to find my future husband".

She didn't pause. She didn't laugh or kid about it. I wanted to make a joke, but instead I looked her in the eyes and didn't say anything for a few seconds. I then just nodded and began eating my ice cream a bit faster. She was honest and focused with her intentions. This girl was there to get what we called the "M-R-S degree". I'll give her this, she kept it real.

Needless to say, my goals at the time were not aligned with hers and that was our first and only date. Shame. She was pretty hot, but it was never meant to be. I ran into her and the new boyfriend a few weeks later. They met in bible study class. Since she introduced him as her boyfriend, I'm only going to assume she married him eventually. For obvious reasons, we kind of lost touch after that semester.

If your goals are clear and defined and you are honest with yourself and the people around you, then you will always be able to cut through the clutter of life. To me, that wasn't the best use of the four years you spend in college, but this was her journey and I am just flattered that she considered me a suitor for a few hours. She was direct and to the point and I respected her goals and ideas, even if they were nowhere near what I was thinking.

If you don't #Tryharder to speak up and lay it all out there for the world, or at least your immediate group of influence, you will never truly be happy. Yes, some people do not known what they want yet, so there might be a period of time where you can do research on your potential future. You don't need to have it all figured out before you start your journey and you can certainly change your mind along the way. Just make sure your decisions are yours and you are not changing due to your insecurities or peer pressure. Also, don't be so blinded by your goal that you don't see the potential exciting experiences, distractions and learning opportunities life provides you.

Good thing for her that she was open and honest about her God. Had she not said what she said, there most certainly would have been a second date and then I would have ruined it by trying to make it a "Blockbuster" night.

Then again, she might be kicking herself on her 20th wedding anniversary because she didn't allow herself the opportunity?

If you've read more than one of my blogs over the years, you would know that I like to write in airports.

Something about traveling and the change of scenery and people watching gets my creative juices flowing and being alone allows me the time to put some words into my iPhone as I wait for my plane to depart. I don't get a lot of alone time, so I try to make the best of it when I do.

Today, I am at the Moline/Quad Cities airport bar. I just dropped my niece back off with her mother after 3 weeks of fun filled Texas summer break fun!

I love my niece.

I hate this airport.

Worst food, nothing to do, warmest beer and they save tons of money with their lack of air conditioning. I am confident that it's warmer inside than it is outside right now. Might be why the beer is warm? Not a huge deal for them, since the airport bar closes at 6pm.

There is seriously nothing to do at this airport! The bar has one TV and we are watching golf. Half the people in here are acting like they give a shit about golf because they have nothing to do but drink and look at something.

The benefit of this airport is that it takes roughly 3 minutes to go through the metal detector and get to your gate. Don't worry about being here 90 minutes early because there are no lines to anything. It's an easy in and out, small city, airport.

I only really hate this airport because 3 weeks ago I spent an extra day here. The reason? The toilet on the last flight out, my flight, was broken and that caused me to miss my connecting flight in Chicago. My flight, at 7:20pm was the last flight out of this small airport, so my 8 year old niece and I were forced to spend the night in the nastiest hotel I have ever stayed in. There may or may not have been an hourly charge for the rooms and maybe a homicide or two have happened here, but this was the 6th place I called and the first one that wasn't sold out. Gee wonder why?

The bonus? American Airlines refused to pay for a room, even thought it was their fault I had to spend the night. Not even the big blue eyes on my beautiful 8 year old niece could convince them to do the right thing. The ladies working the desk for the airlines had a party to get to and my "little issue" wasn't a priority for them as they were just trying to close up for the night. I know there was a party because I am the world’s greatest eavesdropper and I could read the "I am getting the hell out of here" body language pretty well.

I'm waiting till I get back from this leg of the trip to write my nasty worded email to them. I have a fear that if I write it before this leg of the trip or while I wait for my next flight, I might get grounded again. Instead, I'll just blog about it for now. A prematurely written, strong worded, email might jinx things for me on the way back.

I always try to do the right thing. Do you? Honestly?

It sucks sometimes because it often causes us more stress down the road, but I think it's important. Who knows if the karma from this behavior will ever pay off for me, and that's not what it's about, but I still think it's important to take the time to do the right thing. To take the extra steps to bring comfort to another person or help when you can actually help. No false promises. No doing it in hopes of a later payback. No keeping score. Just doing the right thing for the right reason.

When I was a kid in high school I would stay late so that the last kid waiting on a ride after baseball or band practice wouldn't have to wait alone. Often, I was the last kid, and knowing how that felt when everyone just left you there made me more sensitive to the situation.

I've spent more Saturdays than I can count moving people into their new house or apartment. I've never really cashed in on these favors myself, but I can't not help people move. You know when they ask, it's usually out of desperation. One day I'll talk about the 5000 pound kitchen table I carried by myself up 3 flights of stairs and almost died. I'm still internally bleeding from lifting it! One day I will tell you. One day. One day.

I've paid bills and given money to friends and family with the knowledge that I will never see it again. I've reached out to comfort others that may not have done the same for me. It's the right thing to do.

In business, I let people do their job and present their case. Even when they are trying to convince me to agree to do something that I might never do. They are not spinning their wheels because sometimes they actually do convince me to change my mind. Above all, it’s important that they are allowed to get their "at bat" and it's important that I try my best to give them an audience. I am respectful of their time if they are respectful of mine. Again, it’s the right thing to do.

At the end of the day, showing respect is never a bad thing to do. It's the right thing to do and none of us are too busy, all of the time, to take a minute to listen or help...

Unless you're an airline ticket person for American Airlines that just needs to get to a party in an hour; then it's ok to strand a man and a young child at a tiny airport between Iowa and Illinois without even attempting to make a phone call on their behalf.

#Tryharder

Soda

Forest Gump's mom was wrong.

When we took family trips my parents only bought us one soda (Pepsi) and a bag of chips. All 4 of us had to share these items. With the chips, it was a free for all, just reach in and grab, but with the soda, there was a different method of distribution.

The bottle of soda, that might have been 16oz, went from oldest to youngest with the hierarchy of sips. First my sister Kim, then my brother Michael, then me, then Jimmy. Jimmy was the last to get a swig of soda. Jimmy often got stuck with the backwash. Backwash is something that you don't really become aware of till you get older. Poor Jimmy. At least I wasn't Jimmy I guess.

We would take these long car trips, all laid out in the back of my dad’s giant Oldsmobile. This car was special to my dad because it once belonged to his father. I remember us renting a car and driving up to Chicago to pick the 79 Oldsmobile up from my Gram. In order to make it legal or whatever, my dad had to pay his mother a dollar for the car. All in all, I would say that's a pretty good deal. For the longest time, I thought all cars only cost a dollar. Now that I am an adult, with two payments of my own, I would say I was way off!

Depending on your age, you probably did this too. You know, where the folks stuff all the kids in the backseat, maybe or maybe not with seat belts and you'd drive for hours to some place, get out, do or see something, get back in and drive home. Most of the time we went on these trips to see some landmark or we went to some middle of nowhere creek or river and went swimming. All the while, my old man sipped on his beer and smoked a Marlboro. The majority of our trips would cost a tank of gas, a 6 pack and some snacks. We didn't have "theme park money". We weren't "admission fee rich".

We made the best with what we had and saw everything we could within a 3 hour, tank of gas radius, from where we lived. All the while, taking turns sipping on warm Pepsi.

The anticipation of waiting for your turn on the plastic bottle was often difficult. Watching the other kids before you take their time, or at least it seemed like they were, savoring their extended swig of carbonated sugar. It's not that you were all that thirsty, you just didn't want them to drink all of it before you got one last turn. And maybe you thought you were more worthy than they were? Maybe you were thirstier than they were, but you really had no way of proving it. I was the middle boy. I got less than the boy ahead of me, but more than the kid behind me, but not nearly close to what the girl got.

Sometimes that's life isn't it?

Sometimes in life you have to wait a lot longer than you want for things to come your way. You have to bide your time, not complain and pay attention so you don't get skipped. Keeping your eyes on the prize like you would that bottle of warm soda.

When it's your turn, you need to grab it with both hands and make the best out of the swig you take. And if you only get one sip, so you better make it count.

#Whatsyourstory