The kids just wanted to help their Dad. They thought if they surprised him by washing the car, he would appreciate their pluck and initiative.

They didn’t mean to leave the windows open. They never intended to fill the inside of the car with water and suds. The plan didn’t involve making things worse.

Their Dad didn’t mind. He shrugged it off and laughed because he just wanted to spend some time with his boys. My wife, however, was appalled at the lack of concern everyone involved had for the inside of the car.

The car wash scene appeared in a commercial, but that didn’t allay Maria’s concerns. Even though I assured her that the boys didn’t set up a camera and damage the car while secretly filming the scene which would later be turned into a television advertisement, she still had trouble accepting the scene.

This has turned into a recurring theme in our house. My wife’s good heartedness has extended to worrying about the fates of fictional characters.

I guess I should see the positives here. At least she has a respect for proper behavior. She could find no problem with washing a car with the windows down.

But she hasn’t just pointed out the problems with commercials for … whatever product that commercial wanted to sell me. I don’t remember because I was focusing on trying to remind her we were only watching a commercial.

Our daughter is reading the classic novel “The Outsiders” in school. Since Maria doesn’t remember reading it during her school years, she got it out of the library. I had hoped for conversations about “Stay gold, Ponyboy” and “Do it for Johnny!”

Instead, I ended up in a discussion about how the boys would pay for the hospital bills they racked up after the big rumble and whether Ponyboy had an undiagnosed concussion which led to his problems in school at the end of the book.

I know that literary criticism can have some very different schools of thought, but I had never imagined projecting a key issue of the current presidential debate and the hottest topic in pro sports today on a popular novel for junior high students.

I guess I just don’t open my mind as much as my wife does. The health care angle can bring a whole new angle to examining the class difference between the two groups in the books. I’m sure the Socs had a much better HMO. I really had no answer for the concussion stuff.

These kinds of things shouldn’t surprise me, however, since Maria always brings a human angle to our enjoyment of entertainment. I only got mad at her once when she was pregnant because I could not accept that the emotions during that time could bring her to tears during an episode of “The Simpsons.”

In the end, I guess I can benefit from her penchant for looking at things from a different angle. At the very least, I will make sure I roll up the windows on my car the next time I try to wash it. If she gets mad at kids for doing that, imagine how much trouble I’ll get in.