If you are looking for people with lots of opinions, you can stop by at my house. Talk about opinionated people, we are the typical ones. Five of us have our own different opinion about everything and to tell you the truth, it is very entertaining for me, not always; but sometimes.

So, yesterday, after we argue a little, we all agreed to go somewhere. When we were looking for a parking lot, I saw two young men coming out of a “Dollar Store” (a store where everything is sold for a dollar). They both look very happy especially one of them who was almost hugging the stuff on his hand.

Looking at him, I said, “I won’t let my man buy me anything from this store.”

My Berhan immediately said, “What’s wrong with that?”

I said, “He can’t buy me a one-dollar worth of flowers to show me how much he loves me.”

Turning around to me, he said, “But I thought it was the thought that counts.”

To which my daughter, Lydia, nicely replied, “You got it wrong dad. It is not the thought that counts but the TOTAL.”

Did I laugh? You better believe it! How true that is!

If a husband buys his wife flowers from a cheap store, his wife may appreciate him because the money comes from the same “storehouse” but a man who is dating a girl; he better buys the flowers from a little expensive shop if he wants to see her again.

Most of us women are not materialists as most men think we are. Once we are impressed by the man we find ourselves being attracted to, we don’t ask too much. We are the nurturers; the care-givers. We don’t push our men off the cliff to stay on that “impressed” state all the time.

But after everything is said and done, whether the money comes from the same or different “storehouse,” we tend to ask this: “Oh, my gosh! I love this. Where did you get it? How much did you pay for it?” Why? Because it is not the thought but the TOTAL that counts. ///