Location: The garage in husband and wife's new house in Texas
Background: Husband has done whatever he wants in the garage in the past four houses they have lived in. Wife always became frustrated when she needed something in the garage because husband's idea of organization is pile everything on shelves but not in any order so the "order" was undone every time something was needed. Wife was getting very annoyed.
Scene: Husband and wife disagreeing on how to organize the garage. Wife wants to go through everything in garage, throw out or give away stuff they don't need, put similar things together, find storage containers that those similar things will fit in, then build shelves according to size of container. Husband wants to put up a few shelves above garage door. He can't do anything in the garage until he puts up those shelves! Wife, who is extremely annoyed says fine, go ahead. So husband builds shelves. Then husband proceeds to put all of wife's organized boxes that were lined up neatly against wall on the shelves. He does not, however, put up any of his things that are piled up on the floor covering half of the garage. Wife is even more annoyed. Husband is happy because he finally built those shelves!
Months pass: Wife has brillant idea to organize the rest of the garage on the long Thanksgiving weekend. She thinks that surely they can get it done in the three days and still have Sunday to rest before going back to work. Wife thinks Thanksgiving dinner at Cracker Barrel is a good idea. CB cooks the food, family eats the food, CB cleans up the mess AND does the dishes. Husband thinks this is a great idea but thinks that he should still cook Thanksgiving dinner, then clean the kitchen, wake up early the next morning, go do Black Friday shopping, he'll be done early and then they can start working on the garage. Wife says that is starting a day and 1/2 late. Husband assures wife that they can still get it done.
Day 1: Nothing done on Thanksgiving day except cook, make a mess, eat, clean up mess, nap, watch football, eat some more, go to bed.
Day 2: Husband goes shopping, doesn't get home until afternoon, then they start on the garage. They empty out garage, start to decide what will be gotten rid of or given away, get done late at night, put everything back in garage. Wife reminds husband that they could have gotten more done if they had started sooner. Husband ignores wife.
Day 3: Wife threatens husband if he even dares think about making pancakes he's in trouble! Husband wisely chooses a quick bowl of cereal. They go outside and start to pull out everything again and start sorting it putting similar things together and trying to figure out a place to put everything and where to build shelves. They then start putting things in containers. Husband decides that before he can do anything else, he has to build himself a workbench so he runs out to Home Depot to get a few things. He comes back a LONG while later and they start building the workbench. They work well into the night, don't quite finish the workbench and then put everything back in the garage.
Day 4: Family goes to church and then decides to rest from their labors. Wife is a little annoyed that garage looks the same as it did when they started, but husband assures wife that he will work on it during the week and finish his workbench so they can finish garage.
Four months pass: Husband has what he has wanted since he first saw the garage. A few shelves above the garage door and a somewhat organized workbench. Wife, still, after 19 years of marriage opens the door and sees husband's tools neatly put on shelves above workbench. She also sees that after all that work she still cannot park in the garage because of all the yard tools, bikes, giant box of 1000s of baseball cards, and things that husband wants to sell at a garage sale (if he ever has one) STILL in the middle of garage.
Present: Conversation that occured on April 2, 2010
Wife needs her stuff down from the shelves because she is trying to get a scrapbook done of oldest son's scouting years together for his Eagle Court of Honor. She has been asking husband for atleast a month to please get stuff down.
Husband always says he'll do it tomorrow. Husband never does. Wife asks why he put all of her stuff that was stacked neatly along a wall up on the very high shelves instead of his stuff that is in the middle of the garage. Husband said it was easier to do her stuff (because it was stored neatly in plastic containers). Then he reminds wife that she has to admit that those containers have not been touched in two years.
Wife starts to raise her voice and says that he has not used some of his tools since he purchased a fixer-upper, spent hours and hours away from home to finish said house, while his wife was at home taking care of everything from finances to children 4 years ago. Wife then reminds him that his "investment" earned him about a penny a day for several months.
Husband reminds wife of how the market dropped and he was lucky he made any money at all.
Wife starts to get a little bit irrational and starts bringing up other things that husband does wrong like calling her during the day to give her a list of things she needs to get done. Something that annoys wife very much.
Someone mentions eternal marriage.
Wife asks husband if he is going to keep telling her what and how to do things for eternity?
Husband says that it is a blessing that he tells her what to do. We will only be able to take a few things with us when we die, one of them being the knowledge of how to work. He also says that he is hoping that one day wife will learn to do things on her own so that he won't have to keep telling her what to do.
Wife yells that she learned how to take care of the house, bills, children, and everything else while he was off earning pennies a day remodeling THAT house.
Husband says he thinks he will go find some work to do. Husband should probably sleep with one eye open for a few nights. Wife hopes husband has learned all he needs to learn because his life on earth may be shortened a bit.
Ahhhhh......Eternal Bliss
Update:
Wife discovers that writing it all out made her anger go away.
Husband says that this is a very interesting post and thinks wife should be happy since he gives her so much good material for her blog.
Wife smiles at husband but would rather have heard that he would finish the garage.
Husband is planning on sleeping with one eye open.
Wife thinks that's a wise choice for husband.
