When I first started dating my husband, he would often spend one of his days off running errands and getting things done around his apartment. He always said that he just had “so much to get done.” I marveled at how responsible he seemed. As we spent more time together and got to know each other better, I began to realize that we didn’t exactly have the same idea about what it meant to have “so much to get done.” Don’t get me wrong, he is an extremely hard worker when it comes to his career, but when it comes to your basic everyday chores, unloading the dishwasher is a monumental task in his eyes. I came to find out on one of his days off exactly what was on his busy to-do list: go to the bank, get his hair cut, and do laundry. Needless to say, once we moved in together, I eventually realized that his attitude regarding every day menial tasks also carried over into his opinion regarding household maintenance. He wasn’t programmed to put much time or energy into either.
Our first home was a duplex which allowed us to save on our monthly mortgage by renting out the upper apartment. Our first task before the new tenants moved in was to freshly paint every room. My husband wanted to hire painters, but I was able to convince him that we could do it ourselves by appealing to his penny-pinching nature. Although it involved a lot of physical labor on his part, he begrudgingly agreed to give painting a try. I prepared by picking up a couple of five gallon tubs of pure white paint and some basic painting accessories. After an excruciating Saturday, we had completed two bedrooms, the bathroom, hallway, and kitchen, ceilings included. All that was left for Sunday were the living room and dining room, not bad especially since my parents would be joining us. The plan was for my mom and I to take care of all of the trimming while my husband and stepfather took care of the ceiling and walls. In the essence of conserving space, one pair of us began in the living room and the other pair in the dining room. Realizing the night before that we weren’t going to have enough paint, my husband ran out to The Home Depot to pick up a few more gallons so my mom and I had a can to ourselves while my husband and stepfather had the leftover paint from the day before along with two additional gallons. When the trim was finally beginning to meet up with the painted portions of the walls and ceiling, we began to notice that the paints weren’t blending properly. There was a clear distinction between the color of the trim in comparison with the walls and ceilings. What was going on? My mom suggested that maybe we just needed to wait for everything to dry completely. So after about thirty more minutes of continuing with our task, we took a step back expecting to see one uniform color from floor to ceiling. That was not the case. Not one inch of trim matched the ceiling or the walls! Even portions of the ceiling and walls were different shades of white. What’s worse is that we were just about finished. Near tears, I asked my husband, “Did you get the right color?” To which he replied, “What do think I am, an idiot? It’s just white paint!” Then I knew. I went to each gallon of paint that he had purchased the night before. Bright white. Brilliant white. Eggshell. The two rooms were covered with four different shades of white. This was the first and last time my husband ever helped with a painting project. It was also the day I realized that maybe it was for the best that he had no desire to get involved with home improvement tasks.
When I related the whole paint incident to my mother-in-law, it became clear to me why my husband had strayed so far from a do-it-yourself mentality. It turns out that my father-in-law was exactly the same way. If my mother-in-law couldn’t figure out how to fix something herself, the next step was always to call in a professional. I, on the other hand, grew up with parents who were do-it-yourself fanatics. When the stone wall bordering our neighbors’ property began to slant, they took down the wall and rebuilt it. When the fence surrounding our yard began to deteriorate, they took it down and planted bushes and shrubs. When my mom couldn’t find a suitable multi-purpose storage unit for the kitchen that would hold shoes, the garbage can, phone books, gloves, hats, and the phone, she built one herself. They didn’t shy away from any project be it related to plumbing or even electrical. There was a book for everything. My mother was the forewoman on every project, and my stepfather provided the brawn and assisted when necessary. Years of exposure to the numerous projects taken on by my parents is how my Miss I-Can-Fix-It mentality was forged.
Another memorable incident occurred a couple of years after we moved into our single family home. Since the painting debacle in the duplex, I’d made it a point to minimize my husband’s involvement in maintenance projects unless I absolutely needed his strength. One such project was when we had to replace a toilet. I had done everything I could to try to fix the old one, but when a slew of newly installed parts over the course of several months did nothing to stop the toilet from running intermittently, it was time to get a new one. I did some research and decided that this was a do-it-yourself task. The problem was that I needed my husband because lifting a toilet would be a difficult job for me. After turning off the water supply, disconnecting the water lines from the tank, removing most of the water inside the toilet, removing the nuts and washers securing the toilet to the floor bolts, and removing the caulk that shouldn’t have been around the base of the toilet, it was time to enlist my husband’s help to remove the old toilet. Leading up to this point, he had been quite mumbly and grumbly because, in his opinion, installing a new toilet just wasn’t something we should be doing on our own. However, once he successfully completed the task of carrying the old toilet outside, his tune changed. He was then eager to assist in finishing up the job, which entailed installing a new wax seal and securing the new toilet in place. Except, I had inadvertently purchased the wrong size seal so things didn’t go as smoothly or quickly as they should have. Needless to say, I ended up finishing the job myself only to have him brag to friends and family about how “we” had installed the toilet ourselves.
My husband’s most recent attempt to help with home maintenance involves the installation of a light bulb. We recently moved into a brand new home so it was irritating when the light on our garage door opener stopped working, leaving the garage pitch black when we would pull in and close the door behind us. The only logical explanation to me, being that the house and everything in it was brand new, was that the bulb burned out. My husband was out of town at the time, so a few days passed before I was able to ask him to change the bulb. I was newly pregnant so I didn’t want to climb a ladder to change a light bulb if I didn’t have to. Besides, I figured he would be more than capable of handling this one. When he got home and after my fifth request for him to change the bulb, he was finally ready to take action. Well, first I had to show him where to find a new light bulb, but then he was ready to go. About five minutes later, he emerged from the garage. “So is it working?” I asked. To which he nonchalantly replied as he headed toward his office to do some real work, “No, it wasn’t the bulb. There must be something wrong with the garage door opener.” Frustrated, I followed him. “What do you mean? How could a brand new garage door opener already be broken?” He answered, “I have no idea. Can’t you just call the 1-800 number or something? It should still be under warranty.” I sighed and shook my head as I went to check it out for myself. It didn’t make sense that the light would just stop working after only six weeks of use. I went out to the garage, carefully positioned the Little Giant under the opener, and started climbing. The first thing I noticed was that the light cover was ajar as if something was blocking it from shutting all of the way. I opened it and tried the only thing I could think of, tightening the bulb. After the fourth turn, I realized that my husband hadn’t screwed it in all the way. As I made my way over to the see if opening the door would now activate the light, I thought to myself that there was no way it would go on. He must have screwed in and unscrewed the bulb several times before determining that the unit was broken, and this was why the bulb was barely in the socket. Right? Wrong. I pressed the button on the wall, and on came the light. So, exactly how many men does it take to screw in a light bulb? Well, in my world even one man cannot accomplish this task, so it’s a lot easier if I just do it myself!