When Tommy and I Hang Photos...

   Yesterday I decided to start Spring cleaning. At my home that means rearranging every thing in most of the house. After a long almost non existent winter, I needed a change. It doesn't take much to brighten a room. I usually hang new photos on a couple of walls. Perhaps a change of curtains, or a new splash of paint here and a dab of paint there, accompanied by a million other small things to give our home a pick me up after a long gray winter.  This is a  ritual I have done since the first year of our marriage. Why it comes as a surprise to Tommy I will never know, but it does every year.  This year it is more of a surprise because I really need his help in every area.  He is more than willing to help me and for that I am delighted. However, he has his own way of doing things and ideas where things should be placed. He lives here so that is only fair, until he changes my plan.  For 47 years I have, as a rule, placed things where I wanted them.  I think my record is about to be broken this year. It was also broken once about forty years ago.

     Back then I always did my rearranging while Tommy was at work. It did not make him any difference what I did as long as I was happy with the finished project. Wherever we lived we had a cute apartment,  duplex or home always a mixture of a few new things and many, many found treasures.

      Finally, we settled down. We bought a home.  He no longer worked day shift. Now he was working 3-11 at the Nuclear Plant.  I decided to do my rearranging while Tommy was at work. When I finished rearranging our living room I turned out the lights except for the one in the bathroom and went to bed.  He did not know that I had rearranged everything. Nor could he see that I had moved the love seat against the north wall and was using it as a room divider. It was right in his path he usually took to get to the rest of the house when he came home at night.  I forgot to leave him a note in the kitchen.  All was fine until he got home and fell over the love seat as he tried to go to bed. He simply moved the love seat back to where it was located originally. He quietly came to bed and did not say anything. 

   When I woke up at 5 a.m. I was shocked to see the love seat moved.  I moved it back to where I wanted it. It made our living room look cozy. The girls woke up and could have cared less where the love seat was placed. They caught the bus and went to school.  About noon Tommy woke up. We drank coffee and talked about everything but the love seat. I was waiting for him to say something. He was waiting to see what I was going to say about the whole ordeal. Neither of us mentioned the love seat. When he got home from work that night, he didn't fall over the couch but he did slide it back against the wall. This went on for 3 days until I asked him why he didn't like the 'new look'.   His only reply was, " I just don't like it. It is in my way."  However, not to be out done, I did find a set of shelves that worked as a room divider. We compromised and life was fine until forty years later when I needed his help hanging pictures. . . a lot of pictures.

    Now I must be fair to Tommy on this matter.  He wants 'things' done the right way, as a rule.  Me???  I want the end project to look right but I am not as 'particular' about how I reach the end.  To me the bigger the nail the easier it is hang.  When I rearrange the photos later, I just find something that will cover the nail holes. Tommy found this appalling.  When we stripped the walls of photos and he saw what our walls looked like he said  and I quote, 'it looks more like a dart board than sheet rock". I can live with a 'dart board' as long as no one else can see where the 'darts' are located.

   And so it began.  We pulled out nails, puttied holes, sanded, and then painted.  All I wanted to do was hang photos of  the people we love and the places we have been.  I have to admit, it does look nice and it only took three days to do a one day project.  However, everything is level, no little holes show.  We are retired and time does not matter to us. So I would say it is a success.  Next we are moving furniture and I can not do a lot in that area.  I know what I want and Tommy told me yesterday, "Not to worry, he has a plan." I cringed just a little on the inside.  I looked at the walls and said, "Great!!!  So do I!!!  And so the adventure begins again.