While I have a love for fashion, décor and the occasional bling bling, my darling husband is mesmerized with building.
I’d just as soon indulge in new hairstyles, clothing lines and the latest color to paint the walls. His interest is restricted to construction and anything that can be held together with nails.
Now that he’s decided to build us a new house, he’s in seventh heaven.
To keep things interesting, he likes to drag me into the process whenever possible. Knowing good and well that construction and fabrication are not my forte, he ignores my objections and cons me into helping by appealing to my romantic side.
“How about spending some time with me today?” he asked me last week with a wink and a smile.
“Really?” I asked with excitement. “What do you want to do? Go to a movie, take a stroll in the park? Oh, I know, there’s a new cute little shop downtown.”
“No, I was thinking more along the lines of you coming to work on the house with me. I’ll bring coffee!”
“I can have coffee here,” I said with a frown. “Besides, my back still aches from the last time I worked with you. I think I’ll just stay home and think up a New Year’s resolution.”
“You don’t need a resolution. Besides, I have a great job for you this time. It’s called weatherproofing.”
Weatherproofing?
Any woman with an ounce of intellect would have run and hidden at the prospect. Yet for reasons we may never understand I was out of fashionable attire and into old clothes faster than you can say deranged.
“Do you know what this is?” he asked as he held up an aerosol can with a straw coming out of the nozzle.
“A new and fun way to spritz my hair?”
“No, this is the way to begin the weatherization process. You just take this can, point the straw and dispense it.” It was obvious that he was enjoying his little demo, and although I’ve suffered from working with him on more than one occasion, spraying yellow stuff around openings did sound simple. He finished up with, “This is so easy I can’t believe it.” Then he handed me the can and walked away.
I dispensed for quite some time and never realized I was in trouble until I tried to set the can down. Turns out the fun and billowy yellow stuff was not only a crack filler, but had adhesive properties as well.
I was in the middle of the can removal process when I noticed the warning in large red letters on the canister that read: WEAR PROTECTIVE GLOVES WHEN USING THIS PRODUCT.
Well, color me informed, a day late and a dollar short.
Any woman with the sense that God gave a goat would have read the instructions on the can before using it. But when my beloved spouse was going through the demonstrative process, he made no mention of protective anything. He simply squirted and said, “It’s so easy, I can’t believe it.”
Soap and water did nothing to remove it. Lacquer thinner didn’t help, and although the gasoline seemed like a good idea at the time, it only made my exposed skin raw.
Holding my hands as if I were wearing yellow foamy mittens, I marched my smelly self around to the back of the house where I found my beloved whistling on the roof.
“How do you get this stinking stuff off?” I screamed up at him.
“Oh!” he responded, “you should have put on gloves before using that stuff.”
“Duh!” I said as I stomped like a 2-year-old. “Do you have chemicals to remove it?”
“Nope!”
“What about a bar of Lava and a pumice stone?”
“Nope, nothing will take that stuff off.” He yelled down at me before he repeated, “You should have been wearing gloves!”
It was a moment of true ignorance that left me with nothing to show for it but a grimy pair of man hands, asking anyone who would listen, “How does a woman dress when she’s sporting man hands?” I can’t wear my fluffy scarves; I’ll have to do away with my cute and fashionable jackets, and so much for being bejeweled with an occasional bling bling.
All I need to complete the look is a five o’clock shadow. Which, by the way, may not be too far off. Turns out the yellow foamy stuff also transfers and multiplies when one touches one’s face.
There’s a resolution in this somewhere. I just know it.
Lori Clinch is the mother of four sons and the author of the book “Are We There Yet?” Her e-mail address is [email protected].
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Are We There Yet?