Guest Blog: The Husband

I’m the guy who you may have read about in passing on Julie’s blog (or not). I’m the guy who fixes a lot of things that I didn’t break. Things like a clothes dryer with a sock inside it because the lint filter didn’t get replaced.

I’m the guy who wants to cut down the pine trees in the front yard, which our oldest son tries to make me feel guilty about, because I’m tired of constantly raking the pine needles that fall from them. I’m also the one who weeds the garden Julie has occasionally written about and usually the last one standing when illness strikes the household.

As promised, there’s not written much about me in Julie’s blog. I’m OK with that because that’s the way it should be.

A few things you may have known about me (or not): I broke Julie’s complementary (and therefore irreplaceable) birthing center mug. I regularly give her a hard time about her stacks of overdue library books—many of which she hasn’t had time to read--and the associated fines. I’m also the one who sometimes plays a song I really like over and over until Julie can’t take it any more.

Perhaps this will give Julie some future ideas for her blog. As long as it isn’t about me (and I don’t have to fix anything), I’m OK with that.

I often hear the clicking of computer keys, the hum--or is a whine?--of the laptop’s hard drive (that is probably slowly dying) early in the morning and late at night, during the youngest child’s naps, on holidays, Saturdays, and most days ending in a “y.”

When I hear the laptop whining, I know Julie is writing again. Often she is writing for her blog. Sometimes I’m convinced that she’s writing her escape note: Dear family, too tired to write any more I’ll be back someday . . . maybe.

In her blog, Julie tells the truth: We have an environmentally aware 12 year old junior high schooler; a 9 year old fourth grader who is the classic neglected second child; a precocious 6 year old who is destined to be a talk show host with his already famous “Gabeisms;” and we have Nora, the graham cracker whiner, who accompanies Norah Jones, the Grammy winner, while Julie labors at her blog when she’s not laboring over her children.

Julie has long had a desire to be published and finally she has. I’m proud of her and I love her. I’m the unknown husband.

And did I mention I’m OK with that?