If ever there was a season for me, the fall is it.  Not too cold, and heat and bugs usually are but a distant memory.  The vibrant color of the leaves, coupled with the crisp air conjure up images of pumpkins, turkeys, last minute mad dash holiday shopping excursions, and least enjoyable...home projects.  My wife reasons since the days are shorter light wise, and the night air too damp to really enjoy, why not fix something improving the house????

I can't say I totally disagree with her logic, but over the last 30 years, I have gotten pretty good at avoiding what normal people tell me are my "husbandly" duties.  Why all this responsibility fell on me, I don't know, but it's usually equated with that old caveman, hunter, gathering rationale we keep hearing about.  Somehow I find it hard to believe when the cavemen were not securing meat for their families, they were out at the local home improvement center trying to find just the right color paint for the cave to match their wives wooly mammoth rug!

What brought this subject closer to home this year was the completion of the new shop.  It really is beautiful, and everyone who has come in tells us so.  I have remarked that my wife wanted to sell our house and move in there because it's nicer than my house.  Thinking more on the subject, it actually isn't nicer, only newer.  It smells newer, it looks newer, the layout is totally different thus novel, and so far the toilet hasn't developed that annoying rust ring that's impossible to get rid of!

What it doesn't have that my house does is memories, at least not yet.  I won't make the mistake of confusing the words dirty and worn, rather than lived in regarding my house.  After 24 years of living here, raising 2 children, 3 cats, 2 dogs, dozens of injured birds, baby rabbits, and carnival goldfish, the place should feel more comfortable than clean.

In the living room we have a custom shade in the picture window with a mangled slat from our dog Barney who used to jump in the window to see the kids walking down the street after getting off the bus.  After that one time we would open the shade for him only to have his nails dig into the pine trim as he pulled himself along to get a better look.  Barney is gone now, put to sleep in the same living room that he used to sun himself in, but leaving a lifelong memory for my family.

Then there's the indentation in the hall sheetrock from my son's head from when I jumped out of the bathroom to scare him, with the end result of him almost receiving a concussion...I just don't have the heart to spackle that spot.

Our furnace room with the concrete floor is forever stained with cat puke circles from Simba, Cleo, and Neko whom we just recently lost.  I hated all three cats because of that, but would gladly clean up after them once again to have them back.

My wife is constantly after me to seed and hay where our above ground pool stood for 20 years.  Nature is reclaiming the spot with weeds, but that's fine because I can still see the pool's outline, and if I close my eyes and listen, I can still hear my daughter and her girlfriends squealing because someone pooped in the pool!

The oak stairs that I so lovingly stained and polyurethaned a dozen times are pock marked with what looks suspiciously like the outline of Shiman SPD cleats from some idiot walking up and down the stairs while on the phone with their mother...guilty as charged.  No amount of sanding got rid of the marks, but that's fine, because it will forever be testament to my priorities.  Besides, the scratch marks from the cat's claws from chasing each other up and down the stairs, compliment my markings just fine.

Eventually, I may get to some of these projects, but they are not top priority.  I need to get in a lawn at the shop, and start planting trees and shrubs, and concentrate on business to re-coup some of my finances to buy improvement supplies for my house.  In the meantime, I will cherish the blemishes in my house, and enjoy them for the memories of my life there, which take priority over popped nails, and cobwebs in the garage.

As I shuffle out of my house over stained and cracked hardwood floors, past the scratched kithcen counter with the threadbare runner in front of the sink, I can smile and be proud that for my family, I allowed my house to be their home, but thankfull none the less that I have a nice clean, and very new shop to spend my day in...at least new for now until I throw that first wrench, or phone through the sheetrock not in anger, but in honoor of forging a memory...right?

"Yours with brush in hand"  George