Exceptional Family Values

My family were always the exception
to the advice they gave out, or more likely
made sure other family members followed,
whilst explaining the line to follow in a way
that denied them being held accountable
for their advice from who they made follow it.

So many times I would be told 'Don't get yourself
into situations you can't get yourself out of' when
the situation I needed to get out of most
was being told 'Don't get yourself into...     '
by people who put me in those same situations
they soon disowned putting me in.

But as they later said of choices laden with errors
'When you make your bed you have to lie on it*',
they will have their bed to lay on. They can follow
their own exceptional 'do as I say not as I do' advice,
which they clearly needed most in the first place.

*originally an English expression from the1500's about consequence of choice.      

Out Of Sight, Out Of Mind

Before booking into a tax deductable clinic,
for his sex addiction a famous american actor
was asked by a court to account his frequent use
of (female) prostitutes. He had a choice...

His defense was rather legalistic
'I paid them to leave, not for any good
they do whilst they are in my company'.

Many a husband who found more life
in the pubs that they stayed in every day
than in the house they paid for
would say similar to that actor.

They would say of their children and wife
'Paying for the family and house
-which I owned outright-did not mean
that I wanted to own those things,
they simply had to be owned by somebody.
Nor did I see myself as investor in their lives,
in which shared no common values....   '.