Our next-to-last blog entry called a naughty smile your ticket to ride on a mid-marriage shift into intimate overdrive.  This is true, but useless.  Why?  Because it's next to impossible to find your naughty smile once a marriage (or any relationship) slips into gridlock.

When the kids are noisy and your beloved has just left the toilet seat open and visible at the top of the stairs for, like, the gazillionth time... or when your darlin' has just broken a date to finish something less important at work, what you really want to do is grit your teeth and tell everyone to take a hike.  Or hit the road yourself.  But that (whether it's anger or abandonment) doesn't get you where you want to go.  If you want to fly First Class, you need that ticket to ride. But how do you buy it when your emotional resources are below the poverty line? 

"Hang On to Your Ego" sang the Beach Boys, and that Brian Wilson-penned tune hits the nincompoop on the head and puts the brass in pocket, giving you the emotional currency you need to fill up the Piggy Bank Within.  Cuz when your ego's in check, you can ask yourself what you really want.  Is it to alienate your mate?  Abandon him?  No. You want to motivate him.  You want him to come home from work, or to wake you up when he gets back.  So, shut your mouth and smile.  

Now, sometimes we can go from the outside in.  We can smile, and our inner world adjusts to a sunnier attitude.  If your dirty grin won't materialize, try asking yourself this question, "What would The Naughty Bride do?"  

She'd say:

"Darlin' I'm sorry."

and then

imagine

you

naked.