Are You Handy? @LucyBurdette

LUCY BURDETTE: John and I have just passed the 26-year mark in our marriage (yay!) Here's a photo with my dad turning me over to John at the altar. (John's mom Dorothy looking a little worried in the background. In fact, we all had a deer-in-the-headlights look, but it got better, I promise.)

One small complaint he has about me (I’m not going to list all of them or invite him to participate LOL,) has to do with the subject of handiness. 

My brother Doug in 1965 (see the vise?)

My father was very handy, he could fix anything. And he had a wonderful workshop in the basement wherever we lived, with a vise attached to his workbench and all the tools neatly lined up on the wall. My brother learned at his knee and consequently he is even more skilled around his own house. He does things like take apart their kitchen, and build porches, and put up new walls in the living room, and so on.


In our home, we are not so gifted. I can see problems and make general suggestions. Like recently, we wanted to fill in a half moon window in our bedroom that is lovely architecturally, but a disaster when morning comes. Before 6 AM, the light streams in, and the pets get restless and our sleeping is finished.. 

“Look," I say, "do you suppose we could use that giant Amazon box that the pillows came in to make a temporary, stopgap window treatment?"

John grumbles, but agrees to help me. We measure the height of the widest part of the arc, and the width of the arc and we draw this out on the cardboard. Then we cut it out with scissors and stick it in the window. Our ladder is too short, so it’s a little tricky for John to stand up there and poke the cardboard into the hole. And sadly, we haven’t measured accurately enough, so the light still streams in on the sides. 

John cuts out more pieces and duct tapes them to the original cardboard. And that is why we refer to him as the Rube Goldberg of home repair. And that is about the extent of our handiness. 

Here's another example: we have been arguing over who gets the custody of our one remote to enter the garage without having to get out of the car, open the door, get back in the car and roll into the garage. Finally we called a garage door repairman who came out and fixed up both cars instantly. Then he looked at our ceiling, where the doo-hickey motor attaches to the garage door rails.

"Is there some reason why you don’t have lightbulbs in your overhead lights?" he asks gently. "Would you like me to install them?"

I scratch my head. We've lived in this house almost twenty years and we never knew we had lights. So the man screws lightbulbs in and now we don’t have to get out of the car in the dark.

And after I report all this to him, John says, "I hope you’re not going to comment on how your father and your brother would have done that twenty years ago."

No, I'm not. I've been married 26 years and learned a few things. But this is our workshop, I kid you not. Duct tape, front and center.

Are you handy? Do you think it's an innate quality or something you can be taught?




Note from last week: Jana, you've won the Christine Carbo giveaway. Please send your email to ingrid at ingridthoft dot com so she can arrange delivery!