Moments in the Life of a Carpenter’s Wife, Part 1

Cowboy is a cowboy by choice, Carpenter by trade.

The Cowboy Way is my loving husband’s fantasy, and he escapes to it at any opportunity. Who can blame him? A lover of nature and animals, what better way to pass a day than to saddle up and ride the range, strolling peacefully through God’s amazing creation? Sadly, my Cowboy can’t seem to find a range in east central Indiana, and pesky little things like bills can’t be paid living in a fantasy, so he relies on his other incredible talent for silly things like food and shelter.

In our 21 years of wedded bliss, one thing has become strikingly clear to me…a carpenter’s house truly is always the last to be done. Cowboy has often said things like “Honey, I do that kind of stuff all day long, why would I want to do it HERE when I get home?” (Translated: “I have a horse to ride, for crying out loud!”) 

I let Cowboy convince me that we should build a house once. It sounded like a marvelous idea that summer of 1994. What I didn’t know at the time was that my custom-built home wouldn’t actually be finished until May, 1999…just in time for the new owners to move in.

When we first viewed our current home in February 2002, we saw there was plenty of remodeling work to be done, but Cowboy shrugged his shoulders and said “No big deal, that’s simple. We can manage it.”

Mmm-hmm.

Nearly nine years later, this past Monday morning at 9:34 a.m., my cell phone rang. It was Cowboy. “I’m on my way home,” said he, “The project has hit a stall, and I’m going to have a few weeks off. Start clearing things out of the family room, I’m tearing out that rock around the fireplace and hanging drywall.”

Now if I were not a seasoned carpenter’s wife, I would have been soaring…after all, nearly NINE YEARS of looking at that ugly sinking rock wall and stuffing its cracks with steel wool to keep the mice from coming in was a bit wearing on the nerves, but I’m a big girl carpenter’s wife now, and I’m sorry to say I breathed a heavy sigh of frustration as I trudged to the family room grumbling.

Two hours later I began questioning Cowboy as he measured room sizes and door sizes. “While we’re in this mess, I thought we could  replace the trim and the interior doors too. Oh, and I called John to come and give me an estimate for re-painting the entire house. It needs it.”

“Wait!” I said (probably a little too harshly) “Are you SURE you’re not going back to the job site before all of this gets done?” Cowboy shrugged. “They’ll just have to wait until I finish this project.”  Sigh number two passed my lips unchecked…

Mmm-hmm.

It was with a mixture of joy and trepidation that I watched demolition begin in my family room Monday afternoon. Plastic was hung, mortar was chopped, and rock after rock was carried out of the house until all that was left was a gaping hole in the wall to the garage, a second hole in the floor to the crawl space, and the sound of crisp five degree winter winds blustering through said holes, whipping at the plastic barrier. I shivered as I mentally calculated the volume of steel wool needed to fill those holes, and Cowboy explained what he would do “tomorrow.”   

Tuesday dawned bright and early with the ringing of Cowboy’s phone. I stifled sigh #3 as he explained “It’s just a meeting with the architect. I won’t be long.”

Several hours later, as the sun found its hiding place beyond the barn, Cowboy’s truck rumbled back up the drive way and he entered the house. “That meeting took longer than I thought it would…aaaaannnndddd…uhhhhhh…I kinda have to go back tomorrow.” I stood motionless for a heartbeat, then slowly turned to look at the plastic-and-tarp-strewn family room without saying a word. Cowboy’s eyes followed mine, and when I returned my gaze to him all I saw were two big blue eyes and a sheepish grin.  *SIGH!*

…stay tuned…