She's giving it her awl for a pair of shutters

My husband is a building contractor. With construction as his name and fortitude as his game, he can build a home that mere mortals only dream of.

His tools are shiny, his speed square is superb, and with enough knowledge to rival Bob Vila, his walls are to die for.

But, as I'm sure any woman married to the Bob Vila type will tell you, it's not all wine and roses. For one thing, if Bob is going to be Bob, he needs a lovely assistant, and who better than his blushing bride to put down her makeup brush and be available to hand him his speed square?

Having been his right-hand gal on more than one occasion, I've picked up on a thing or two. I'm not one to blow my own gasket, but I can run a caulking gun. I know a chisel from a mallet, and although they say I swing the hammer like a girl, I can drive a 16-penny nail home in less than 20 hits.

Quite frankly, I give it my awl.

Given that, I thought nothing of it when my blessed mother called the other day and asked if I'd stop by to hang shutters in her dining room. "They're the cutest darned things," Mom said happily. "They're white, they're rustic, and they just scream patina.

"Stop over tomorrow and we'll have some fun," she continued with enthusiasm. "I'll even skip my afternoon soap operas." Then she dropped her voice an octave and added, "We'll just have to make sure that we finish up before your father gets back from the coffee shop."

I knew what she meant. Even though I'm married to a man who is the equivalent of Bob Vila, men don't understand rustic shutters or patina and certainly would never believe that a couple of pieces of wood that had been left outside to rot would be the cutest darned things when hung over a window.

I packed up my drill and my tape measure, and loaded up screws like a nut. I showed up on Mom's doorstep at or around 1 p.m. "Hurry and come in," Mom said as she pulled me inside. "We have less than three hours before your father returns."

The shutters were rustic all right — so rustic, they weren't intact. They needed a hinge here and a screw there and might have looked their best on the bottom of a bonfire. Not one to be easily dissuaded, I began taking things apart and running the drill as if I were the sharpest tool in the shed.

Along about 2:45, my sense of fun and adventure had begun to fade. In fact, I had become quite cranky. The wall was full of holes, the shutters were anything but straight, and if any project had ever looked as if it came out of the Cutest Darned Thing magazine, this was not it.

Who knew that shutters could be so uncooperative? I did my best to measure and analyze the predicament, and much to my dismay, I even applied the principles of math. I added and subtracted, and I'll be dogged if the darn shutters still didn't look as if they'd barely survived a hurricane.

I was running out of patience when my precious mother said, "So, on a scale of 1 to 10, how much fun are you having?"

I didn't answer her verbally, but I did shoot her a look.

"You know, I gave up my soaps for this," she added.

"No one cares if you gave up your soaps, Mom. Look at this mess!"

"What do you mean, 'No one cares?' Billy was going to find out today if Gina's baby is his!"

"If we hammer a nail over the window and tie a fishing line to it, do you think anyone would notice it was holding the shutters straight?"

"Your father might, and he's due any minute."

"Can't you send him on another wildgoose chase?"

"I can't. He bought it when I sent him to the super-center for dog food. He thought little of it when I asked him to stop by your sister's to check her tire pressure. But the errand to the library to pick me up a cookbook just about put him over the edge, and now I have to cook dinner!"

"You could always send him to the pharmacy for Prozac."

"How about I have him swing by the job site and pick up your Bob Vila?"

I took a look at the mess I'd made — the extra holes in the wall, the scraps of wood strewn about — and I thought of how my beloved spouse would respond to my work.

If there was one thing for certain, it was this: he'd shutter to think.

Lori Clinch is the mother of four sons and the author of the book "Are We There Yet?" You can reach her at www.loriclinch. com.