Focus on the Family with Jim Daly

John Branyan: You know, you got to have your driver’s license renewed every four years but you don’t have to have your marriage license renewed ever.

Audience: (laughing)

John Fuller: Well, that’s an interesting perspective. Something I hadn’t heard before. Uh, welcome to Focus on the Family with your host, Jim Daly, and I’m John Fuller.

Jim Daly: And John, laughter is a great way for us to get over some of the discomforts of everyday life and our guest John Branyan will help us get some perspective on our own marriages as he takes a humorous look at his.

Uh, you know, it’s so easy to get tunnel vision and focus on the problems that you have with your spouse. And sometimes there really is value in taking a step back and just recognizing the fact that men and women are very different (laughs) and a lot of our conflicts stem from those gender differences.

When we aired this program in 2016, it became one of our top 10 shows for the year so I know you’re really gonna enjoy this light-hearted look at the marriage relationship and the true value of lasting love illustrated by a poignant story John will share in just a few minutes.

John: And the audio is from John Branyan’s comedy DVD called Wedlocked. And I’ll explain the visuals here. John is at the Department of Motor Vehicles sitting next to a rather quiet stranger musing out loud about marriage and you’ll hear the other man respond once or twice. Here now is John Branyan on Focus on the Family.

John B.: You know, I’ve been, I’ve been married for 21 years same person. And I think that the secret to a long-term relationship is flexibility, adaptation. You got to pretty much bend with the wind or it’ll just knock you flat.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Because it’s always in a state of flux, it’s always changing. I mean, after 21 years she’s not the same girl that I married. The relationship is a lot more intense. She asks me questions.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Questions that I don’t know the answers to because they are questions that no man has ever known the answers to.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Deep, probing, impossible questions. “What are you thinking?”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: I’m a guy. I’m thinking nothing.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Zero. Zilch. Zip. Nada. Nothing. She’s a girl. Girls cannot think nothing. That never happens. When her mind is blank there’s still billions of calculations flying through it.

Audience: (laughs)

John B.: Angles being considered, thoughts being processed and organized, colors being coordinated. She’s like a four gighertz, 256, terabyte file serving computer. I’m like that little solar calculator that comes free with cigarettes.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: And I still spend time with other guys, you know, me and the guys go out, we talk. Never once have I ever said, “Hey, Al, what you thinking?”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Because I don’t care.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Plus he’s a guy, I know what he’s thinking. Nothing.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: She wants to borrow stuff from me that I never have like tissue and Kleenex. “Can I borrow a tissue. Johnny, I need a tissue. Can I have a tissue, sweetie? Hmm?”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: No. Men don’t carry Kleenex. To a guy carrying Kleenex and wearing long sleeves is redundant.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: So I guess what I’m saying is I’ve never really been much of a fitter-inner.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: I’ve never been a belonger. In high school, it was that way growing up, all the way through high school. The car I drove in high school was a brown Chevy Vega.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Two doors and three speeds.

Audience: (laughs)

John B.: And that was a chick magnet.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: It’s a poor man’s Pinto.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: So I had no girlfriends in high school but had more sisters than the Catholic church.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: And then a couple years after graduation this miracle, along came Lori, a long came this girl, and she said, “I love you. I really love you.”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: I should have been suspicious right there.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: I should have known I was in over my head we started planning the wedding, planning the wedding. We had to have a wedding rehearsal. That’s what she told me, “Got to have a wedding rehearsal, John.” Like, “Why? Is it tricky?” She goes, “Yes. It’s tricky.”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: I don’t mind. I don’t mind rehearsing. I just wish we would practice something, there were so many things I needed practice on. There were so many things I didn’t know how to do, still don’t know how to do them. Consequently, 20 years later, I’m still… I could have used practice on a thousand things.

I could have used, I could have used practice dropping off to sleep at night with a pair of subzero feet in my back.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: You, you have frostbitten my kidneys.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: I could have used practice standing in the women’s clothing department in front of the dressing room door holding her purse.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Trying to hang onto a shred of masculine dignity.

Audience: (laughs)

John B.: And even getting used to each other. Just occupying the same sleeping space at the same time. That’s what’s difficult. Getting used to each other’s nuances. She’s a morning person.

Audience: (laughs)

John B.: She’s a morning person. The sun barely breaks over the horizon, she’s hovering over the bed. “Looks like we had… The sun’s up.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Sky is blue. The birds are singing. It’s gonna be a great day. Time get up, up, up, up.” You know what I would rather hear at 6:00 in the morning? “Everyone on the ground, this is a stickup.”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: ‘Cause at least the stick up guys will let you lay down.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: The birds, the birds are singing, that is the only sound that they know how to make.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: You know what I think? I think one bird gets a early and the noise outside the window is all the other birds going, “Shut up.”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: And even climbing into bed together, occupying the same sleeping space takes… You know, she’s my wife. I, I love her, but there are still times when I will climb into bed next to her, I pull her over close, I can smell her perfume, start to kiss the back of her neck, blow in her ear.

Audience: (laughs)

John B.: She looks over at me and says, “What are you thinking?”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Gosh, I don’t know. What are you thinking?

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: And she goes, “I was just thinking that if we fold the dish towel smaller-

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: … they will fit more efficiently into the kitchen drawer.”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: That is exactly what I was thinking.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Let’s go do it now.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Maybe while we’re up, I can spackle.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: And then into the relationship came the children. We had four babies… Somehow.

Audience: (laughing)

Man in License Bureau.: Spackling accident.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: And that changes everything. I learned so much. I learned that they separate pregnancy, I learned they separate pregnancy into three things called trimesters. And the reason they’re called trimesters is because during that time the husband tries to muster up the strength-

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: … to stay in the house with a pregnant  woman.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: The first, first trimester, first trimester two cells come together form a tiny human being. The second trimester that tiny human being begins to grow. And then the third trimester the pregnant woman changes from a human being-

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: … into a Tasmanian devil.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: And so I come in the front door and she’s “boom, baga, boog, ga goo, ga…”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Hey, where, where’s the cat? (Sound of burp)

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: And it was at that moment in my life when I realized this is not the same girl that I married.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: This is not the same species that I married.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: After just a couple of years of marriage, you start to see sides of each other that are kept hidden when you’re dating. When we dated she never devoured small domesticated mammals.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: I would have remembered that.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: At the same time there’s parts, there’s parts of becoming a new father that aren’t completely terrifying, kind of heartwarming. Like when she was about six months along into the first pregnancy, she developed this, this intense desire to learn everything she could about becoming a mother, carrying children, raising children, because it was our baby. It was my baby. (laughs) And she wanted to do it perfectly.

“This is your baby, John, living inside of me. Sucking the life out of my organs like a parasite.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Making me blow like a fish on the beach, doing back flips on my bladder all because of you-

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: … my love.”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: So she went to the library, she got books on the subject. She checked out videotapes. She subscribed to magazines and so by the time the babies arrived, we were perfect parents. She because of months of loving maternal research, and me by default-

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: … ’cause I had her to explain everything to me. All the stuff I had to know, like trading off feedings in the middle of the night, baby cry, and she’d nudge me. “John, baby’s crying.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Do you hear that crying baby?

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: That is your baby.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: The book says that daddy should take a turn feeding for bonding.

Audience: (laughs)

John B.: So bond.”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: So I would stumble down the hall into the kitchen looking for bottles. And then it would occur to me, “Hey, we’re breastfeeding.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: This is gonna hurt like a monkey.”

Audience: (laughing)

John: You’re listening to Focus on the Family with Jim Daly and that is John Branyan. What a gifted communicator. (laughs) And if you’ve enjoyed laughing along today, we wanna encourage you with two full hours of family-friendly comedy in a free set of audio downloads. You’ll get this message from John Branyan plus more humor from Kenn Kington, Jeremy Nunes and Chonda Pierce.

You can get the Focus on the Family Comedy Collection at our website. That’s focusonthefamily.com/broadcast or call for details. We can tell you more when you call 800-A-FAMILY. That’s 800-232-6459. Let’s return now to more from John Branyan.

John B.: And in the midst of all of it, in the midst of unanswered questions and confusion of roles and kids flying around the planet, in the middle of all the chaos, I’m still expected to be romantic.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: I’m still expected to breathe new wind on the embers of romance.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: She will appear from nowhere. “Take me someplace.

Audience: (laughs)

John B.: Take me someplace nice because we never go anywhere. That’s why. We just stay home all the time and I don’t wanna stay home all the time. I wanna go someplace with you. I wanna go out somewhere with you, so take me someplace. Take me someplace nice.”

Audience: (laughs)

John B.: All right. Where do you wanna go?

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: “I don’t wanna tell you where to take me.

Audience: (laughs)

John B.: That would ruin everything.

Audience: (laughs)

John B.: You have to think of someplace to go.”

Audience: (laughs)

John B.: And so I got tickets to the tractor pull.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: And that was wrong.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: We have so many friends whose cummerbunds matched the flowers match, the dresses and they march down the aisle, they took a vow, a vow until death do us part and then they parted.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: And they weren’t dead.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: I think love takes longer than that, it takes a lifetime. It takes a whole lifetime to learn what really annoys them.

Audience: (laughs)

John B.: So you can do it again and again and again.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: If you stick with it eventually you’ll zero in on the source of conflict. You’ll figure out what it is that causes the two of you to fight. Lori and I did. It’s me.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: I remember the first fight that I caused, it was right after we got married. And I wanted to go out with the guys, you know, just me and the guys like we used to for old time sake. And she wanted me to stay there with her and cut the cake and throw the bouquet and-

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: And even now sometimes she’ll get me backed into a corner, maneuvered so I can’t escape, and she’ll say, “John, listen sweetie. I was just reading in Cosmo.”

Audience: (laughs)

John B.: Cosmo, great. Bring it on. “If you could start all over again, if you could wipe the slate clean… Hey, look at me this is important.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: If you could start all over again and wipe the slate clean, start a fresh, would you get married again?”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: The speed with which you answer that question is as important as the answer itself.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: And the truth is after 21 years the answer to that question is yes. I would, I would marry the exact same girl again because what I’ve learned over these years is that the two of us together are somehow better than the sum of the individual parts and she is so many things I could never be and I’m so many things that she doesn’t wanna be.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: It’s complimentary. We haven’t mastered it, we’re still learning, both of us. I’m learning. She’s learning. I’m learning that she’s like a, like a flower, a flower with infinite petals and each petal is a little more complex and a little more lovely than the petal that preceded it. And it’s gonna take a lifetime to examine every subtle nuance, every tiny little facet of her personality that makes her unique and special, different from all the rest and beautiful.

I know her favorite color. I know how she looks in the morning. I know her shoe size. I know how she cooks. Beep, beep, beep.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: “It’s an ancient family recipe.”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: For microwave popcorn? That’s-

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Family recipe is this side up.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: I know how she drives. Wow.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: She’s got this motto, “Well, we pay for insurance we might as well use it.”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: She does stuff with insurance I could never do. She hit a deer. She once hit a deer that was already dead in the middle of-

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Tore the running board off the car, knocked the wheels all out of alignment, she was so upset. “I’m sorry, John, I didn’t hit him on purpose. Hmm.”

Audience: (laughs)

John B.: I didn’t get mad. I couldn’t get mad because, you know, those deer crossing signs by the road, they always show the deer like this.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Never shows them like this.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: And late at night on long trips when I’m driving, she’ll sit up front with me and she’ll go, “Well, it’s late at night on long trip, you’re probably pretty tired aren’t you because it’s late at night on a long trip.

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: So I’ll just sit up front with you and keep you company, help you stay awake. Hmm.”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: Five miles down the road, she’s sound asleep. So this is what I do. Pull into the first rest park that I come to where the semis are idling with their lights on, pull nose to nose with the semi, throw the car in neutral, hit the gas and go, “Ahhh.”

Audience: (laughing)

John B.: But you know what happened after the wedding cake was eaten and the flowers wilted, all the thank yous have been sent out? After that, after the wedding, then real life settled in and real life, I mean, day-to-day life is hard and it’s mundane and it doesn’t feel the way it feels when you’re dating, someday it doesn’t feel like it’s worth it.

And every time those feelings come over me I have these memories of my great-grandparents. When we were little we’d go over to their house, my brother and I, and Great-Grandpa Frank would sit in a big overstuffed chair by the window, and we’d stand right in front of him and he’d lean forward in that chair and talk with his hands and tell us all the stuff that little boys are supposed to know.

You know, he taught us how to build a tree house up in the branches so the floor wouldn’t sag, roof wouldn’t leak, taught us how to sit on the handlebars of our bikes and ride them backwards, downhill-

Audience: (laughs)

John B.: … with groceries. And all afternoon in the rocking chair right next to him was my Great-Grandmother Mayme, and she would laugh at the same jokes that she’d heard him tell a billion times before. In the middle of a story he’d look over, pat her on the knee, wink at her, jump right back in and never miss a beat.

And as years went by we started to notice that Mayme was having trouble remembering things like the names of the neighbors that lived right next door. So my great-grandfather’s job became to just be with Mayme constantly, make sure she didn’t forget something important like unplugging an iron or shutting off the stove, but she got worse, and pretty soon she was more than he could handle all by himself.

He was too old so they had to move out of their house and into a nursing home. And I remember the time that we went to visit in the nursing home, dinner time. Great-Grandpa Frank sat across a table from Mayme, his plate sat over to the side, got cold.

Well, he took one spoonful at a time from her plate, fed it to her. Then he’d smile at her, he’d wink, take a napkin wipe her chin, maybe couldn’t use a toilet by herself. So every time she had to go, he’d take her in and help her with all of those responsibilities every single time.

And during all of those years when he was doing that, we never heard him complain. He never once snapped and said, “You know what? I’m an old man and I’ve had a long tough life too and now I can’t even blink with Mayme around because if I do, she may wander off or she’ll fall and hurt herself and I have to feed her, I have to bathe her, I have to take her to the toilet.”

He never complained. Then there was a day that my brother and I went to visit nursing home, Great-Grandpa Frank sat in his big, overstuffed chair, he looked up at the two of us and said, “You know boys…” And there was a tear right here.

He said, “Mayme, Mayme doesn’t know who I am anymore.” And that was the first complaint that I ever heard him speak about his little bride. It didn’t seem to bother him to have to feed her and bathe her and take her to the restroom. What broke his heart was when all of those times were over.

Two of them were married for 70 years, 70 anniversaries with the same person and I am positive that after all of those decades, she was not the same girl that he married. She didn’t look the same. They didn’t do the things they used to do when they were young and strong. She couldn’t even remember who he was, but there’s no doubt that my grandfather was still crazy in love with her ’cause love is not what you feel. Love is what you do.

John: Hmm. What a touching way to end this lighthearted look at marriage on today’s Focus on the Family with Jim Daly featuring John Branyan.

Jim: Wow, John, I love, uh, his last line there. Love is not what you feel, love is what you do.

John: Hmm.

Jim: In fact, the Bible puts it this way. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. And that’s from the New Testament in 1st Corinthians 13:7 and 8. And what a wonderful example, uh, Great-Grandpa Frank is to all of us to love his wife, to care for her, even when she couldn’t recognize his face anymore. That’s true love.

And, you know, caring for a chronically ill spouse is a very difficult process. I have a number of friends in that space right now, and if you’re in that situation or if you have other stressors in your marriage, please give us a call. We have caring Christian counselors available to spend some time with you on the phone, and perhaps give you a referral to a like-minded counselor in your area.

It’s a free service that we’re happy to provide thanks to donors just like you. Um, and if you feel like your marriage needs an intervention, let me strongly recommend… I think the greatest marriage intervention that’s happening in our country today, it’s called Hope Restored. It’s a 4-day intensive program. Hope Restored helps couples break free from, uh, cycles of pain in their marriage and thrive in ways that used to seem impossible.

John: Hmm.

Jim: And 99% of couples who attend say that they would recommend Hope Restored to a friend. That is an incredible number-

John: Hmm.

Jim: … and quite a compliment.

John: Yeah.

Jim: Best of all when we follow up with these couples two years later, four out of five, 80% are still married and report that they’re doing well. And that’s an incredible number.

John: Yeah. We’ve seen a lot of marriages saved thanks to Hope Restored.

Jim: So if you’ve been giving to Focus on the Family, let me say thank you, uh, for making it possible for us to provide these resources for desperately hurting marriages. Over the past year our research shows that we have help together, uh, over 700,000 couples build stronger marriages or resolve a major marital conflict.

Uh, and that’s thanks to you, our extended family, the donors, uh, both large and small. That doesn’t matter. It is, uh, our cumulative effort that counts.

Finally, we want to give a gift back to you through a free audio bundle of four comedy presentations. It includes this broadcast from John Branyan, uh, plus uplifting messages from Kenn Kington, Jeremy Nunes and Chonda Pierce. Download the comedy collection when you visit us online today.

John: Yeah. It’s got two full hours of family-friendly comedy and you’re gonna find it at focusonthefamily.com/broadcast. You can also call us if you have any questions our number is 800, the letter A, and the word FAMILY.

Next time, Chuck and Ann Bentley explain how they were able to overcome their extreme financial differences.

Preview:

Chuck Bentley: Well, she’s the classic saver and I’m the classic spender.

Jim: Okay.

Chuck: I’m the big spender in the family. I like to spend money. Uh, I have big dreams, big goals, big ideas. If it’s got four-wheel drive, camouflage, or any of those kind of things and I would wanna buy it.

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