Honey Do Do

The other night I sat down on the couch, flipped on the tube, and laid eyes on a new TLC show called Honey Do. For the first fifteen minutes, I was rendered totally helpless by the sheer empirical genius of a show aimed straight at my married, female solar plexus.

The premise of Honey Do is that women whose houses are in extreme disrepair – think toilet seats untethered from the ceramic throne, curtain rods hanging at an angle, cupboard doors off hinges—are visited by the Four Handy Magi, who instead of bearing gifts are wearing toolbelts. That Jonathan, Kevin, Ben, and Dan are gorgeous, young, and overtly flirty with the beleaguered wife is a given. Jonathan even has a British accent and a faint resemblance to Teddy Thompson, which to me is just gilding the lily.

In back-to-back episodes I watched, the wife pointed out all the areas where her husband was lacking the tools of the trade. Almost immediately, two of the Honey Do Dudes stripped off their shirts to drill things, rivulets of sweat glimmering down their bare, muscled torsos. Then the other two rubbed the wife’s feet and fed her Mimosas and baked goods.

Every few minutes, the husband would enter the scene and say, “Could you PLEASE put some shirts on?” or grumble, “Those men were rubbing up on mah waaff and I didn’t like it, no, not one bit.” But then he’d realize that the payoff for being totally emasculated on television was that the bookshelves in the family room were finally assembled, and the fireplace was resurfaced, and the husband would make peace with the whole process even if he had a new dead spot in his soul where he could never fully trust his wife again.

I am not made of stone. For a long moment, I fantasized about what I could put on my application. The light switch in the guest room closet that doesn’t do anything! The cold water faucet in the upstairs tub! The loose towel bar in the kitchen! A topper on my flat Mimosa!

But seeing the wreckage of these women’s houses, both of which could done double duty on Hoarders, it was clear that our problems were small beer. And the longer I watched British Jonathan and his crew make snide comments about the husband’s shortcomings while gyrating like Chippendales models around the stepladders, the more it began to actively bother me.

First, because I am nothing if not safety conscious. Seems like if you have to wear eye protection to operation a circular saw, a shirt is also a good idea. No one wants to slice off a finger, or a nipple.

Second, because ever since friends of mine had a home makeover on the TLC show “Curb Appeal,” it bugs me that these home shows pretend to get the work done so quickly. Real reality is that those projects last for WEEKS, and the families live in the construction zone, and the editing makes it look like it happened in two days and that it was all a surprise. Sure, the husband probably could have cleaned and organized the garage sooner, but to make it look like it was a two-hour job that he had been avoiding is a bit disingenuous.

But in the end, it was the whole Damsel in Distress vibe that I found incredibly patronizing. British Dan and his boys couldn’t believe how badly the wives had been neglected by a husband unwilling to change the lightbulbs in the bathroom fixture. One woman’s plea was for the guys to hang a second curtain on a curtain rod. I mean, she was short, but there are chairs to stand on. Lightbulbs and curtains, people, not rewiring the electrical system.

When my youngest was about four, we had a rat problem in the house. Don’t judge; they love the ivy that makes our part of Oakland so green. A trap in the unfinished basement snapped one day, its job done, while my husband was away on a long business trip. I called him and said, “I am not touching that thing. You can take care of it when you get home. I don’t even care if it starts to smell.”

I hung up and turned to see my cherubic four year old daughter with her wacky head of curls watching me, both hands on her hips.

“Mom,” she said, plainly exasperated after listening to the conversation. “If you want to make Dad impressed of you, you have to take care of the rat. BEFORE he gets back.”

On that day, when I triple-garbage-bagged the rat and carried it out by the tips of my industrial rubber gloves to throw in the garbage, gloves, trap, and all, I learned a good lesson not just about being capable, but about setting an example for the two young damsels watching my every move. And if I want them to be impressed of me, I better show them what I’m capable of with a Philips head screw driver, a paint brush, and a hammer. I do have some pride.

I better also teach them that most Handy Guys who come to the house are more likely to look like the clueless husbands with beer bellies and bad trousers than they do the TLC Adonises who are laying sod. The truth is, if I lined up my husband with the plumber, exterminator, electrician, and drainage guy who keep this house running, the only one I’d want to see without a shirt on is the one I’m already married to.

But…if, the next time the electrician comes, he wants to bring some pastries? I would not say no to those.

“Handyman Blues” from Billy Bragg…so funny, so good.

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