Not Risky Enough

Posted inColumns

To be completely honest, the thought did cross my mind for more than a few seconds. I almost went ahead and did it.

Let me set the scene before going any further. My wife and daughter went away for a few days to visit friends. I had the whole house to myself, a situation I get to enjoy a few days a year.

I do miss my family when they go on these kinds of trips, but I also enjoy getting in touch with the side of me which is normally suppressed due to rules about cleaning up after myself and making sure everything goes in its place.

Because Maria had not completed the living room painting project, the house took on a completely different feel this time. I think I took more liberties with my messiness because of this situation.

I’m not allowed to help with painting projects – it’s a long story – so I could really do nothing about the minor changes to the room.  Some furniture still sat pushed to the middle of the living room. A paint can sat on some newspaper in the corner. None of the windows had any curtains.

As I sat on the couch the first night, I realized that the minor amount of disarray seemed a little confusing. It felt like I had just moved in or had seen some other major life change. The lack of curtains and area rug covering the hardwood floor made the biggest difference.

That’s when I started to think of the possibilities. Spending time home alone always leads to massive amounts of grilling, staying up too late and not making the bed. This time, however, something better came to mind.

Doing My Part

Posted inColumns, Family

I firmly believe we should never stop trying to better ourselves. This wonderful world can offer new and exciting experiences regardless of how much we think we know.

I recently had a chance to put this belief into action. My wife wanted to paint the living room since we had a kid-free house for a few days. Even though I am not allowed to paint – that’s a long story which goes back a number of years – I did offer to help prepare things for the project.

So I moved furniture and carried the area rug upstairs. I made a Sunday morning trip to the hardware store and wandered around the aisles until we found everything on the list. I even spotted something we needed on a shelf before Maria did. That’s husband-of-the-year type stuff right there.

When we had the room all prepared and the supplies purchased, I thought I would be excused from the project. While I did have plenty of things I could accomplish on my own, particularly napping, I did want to help as much as possible.

So Maria told me I could help clean the walls. Against my better judgment, I got excited. I could actually claim that I did something helpful on a painting project.

We had purchased some special cleaning solution – that’s the stuff I found at the store – to wipe down the walls, but I had a chance to help even before we got down to that dirty work.

She let me use the Swiffer.