Marty Grunder: Winning advice

Marty Grunder

Through the years I’ve gotten a lot of advice. Eat your vegetables, brush your teeth, work hard-play hard, pay cash for everything, stop and smell the roses, timing is everything, and of course, the harder you work, the luckier you get. But of all the advice I’ve received, the words that ring in my head daily came from my lovely mother. Here’s what she taught me: You get more with honey than vinegar. Or in clear terms: be nice, it will help you get done what you need to get done; life’s too short to be mean.

In 1978, we had a blizzard of epic proportion at our home in Ohio. When there is talk of a snow storm, the local media frequently show photos from that storm. I’ve shown my kids pictures and they are truly unbelievable. We had snow drifts at our house more than 20 feet tall, and we were stranded in our home for a week. The roads were closed and it was a big problem. My father worked for the Ohio Department of Transportation in a leadership role. He had influence over many things associated with highways and county roads. He thought by making phone calls to the local county doing our snow removal, he could get them to get our street open so we could go to the store and get essentials. For days his calls did nothing. The last call I overheard him make was so harsh I thought whoever drove the snow plow better get out here or my dad, a former tough guy from the U.S. Army was going to make some people ‘pay.’ Despite my dad’s calls, no snow plow came down the street. He was vinegar for sure.

Later that day, I came up the hallway and heard my mom on her bedroom phone. Being a curious 10 year old, I listened to my mom talk very nicely to the county garage about the road out front and asked them if they could please come out and clear the roads. She said, “I know you men are working very, very hard. We appreciate you. But, if you could find time as soon as you’re able to clear our road, I would be grateful. We’re almost out of food, and I have three young children.” She thanked them profusely for doing a dangerous and tiresome job and hung up the phone. My mom was honey.

Two hours later, my father yelled out, “Here comes the snow plow, I told you they’d get this road open if they knew what was good for them.” My mom smiled and nodded her head, not saying a word.

My father passed away unexpectedly over 10 years ago.  I miss him.  He was a good guy, a hard worker, determined and good at all types of things. But he wasn’t the greatest at handling problems. He was tough and not very friendly in a lot of his dealings. My mom, on the other hand, was the exact opposite. My mom lives right around the corner from me, and we are very close. She might be the nicest person I have ever met in my life. She never gets mad, she is nice and gets all kinds of people to want to help her naturally.

Her example, her way of doing things, her constantly teaching me to be nice, was the best advice I have ever received. I don’t always follow it, and when I don’t follow it, I tend to get in trouble.  After all, momma’s always right.

Marty Grunder is a speaker, consultant and author; he owns Grunder Landscaping Co. See www.martygrunder.com; mail
marty@gie.net.