Do-it-Yourself Has Limits

There are many reasons I love my husband. His ability to fix things around the house is not one of them.

While nobody beats Keeper at being kind, supportive, and amusing, nobody would ever call him handy. When something needs to be repaired around the house, I can count on him to say, “Aren’t there people we can call to take care of this?”

Well, sure. There are skilled handypersons galore. The problem is, it’s just too embarrassing to call them to do things that any reasonably intelligent adult should be able to do. Hiring someone to change a doorknob is like employing a chef to make you a grilled cheese sandwich. Unless both your arms are broken, you should just do it yourself.

Since the phrase “do it yourself” causes Keeper to start stuttering, I am always looking for help with small jobs that don’t warrant hiring skilled labor, especially when I have my own workforce: my children.

When Jason visits, he inevitably gets stuck with computer-tweaking duty. There is always a little something that needs to be hooked up, or something that needs optimizing, and he is good-natured about singing for his supper. Besides, we both love an excuse to go to Best Buy.

Tom’s expertise is anything mechanical. When he visits from the Midwest, I don’t ask him to tune up my car, although as a master certified auto technician, he could do it in his sleep. We have so little time together that I don’t want him to spend any of it under my car.

I did have a few fix-it jobs for him when he visited last February, however. The doorknob on the French doors kept sticking, trapping us either in the dining room or on the deck. Likewise, the door to the garage had to be lifted and jammed into place to shut properly. One situation was dangerous, one was incredibly annoying. We put up with it for 6 months because I didn’t want to admit that I couldn’t fix it myself.

I could admit it to Tom, though. Plus, I figured he owed me for all the radios, TVs and remote controls he took apart when he was a kid. So, during his last visit, we went to Home Depot in search of hardware. An hour later, my two doorknobs had been replaced and as a bonus, Tom replaced the broken magnetic latch on the linen closet. It’s only after everything was working perfectly that I realized how much the little stuff bugs me.

So, when the doorbell started sticking, causing the transformer to buzz continuously until someone jimmied the button to the “off” position, I told Keeper that we should get it fixed. “The UPS man always rings the bell when he leaves a package. What if I’m not home and the thing buzzes all day?”

“Aren’t there people we can call for that?” he answered.

I decided this project had “do it yourself” written all over it. I journeyed to Home Depot and wandered around for 45 minutes. I browsed electrical, looked at doorknobs, and studied their selection of doors. When none of these categories turned up a doorbell, I asked someone. He led me to the back of the store, at the end of an aisle of lighting fixtures. I dismissed him with a thank-you, determined to figure this out myself. I chose a button that looked similar to the one we had.

Back at home, I Googled “replace a doorbell” and learned that I needed to turn off the power for safety’s sake, and that there were only two wires and it didn’t matter which one went where. Within 10 minutes we had a new doorbell, one that goes “ding dong” and then shuts up.

I fixed it for $12, a lot cheaper that flying my son out from the Midwest. But now that my garbage disposal is broken, I’m thinking he’s way overdue for a visit.