Not Now, Dear

I’m sure every wife feels it. The pang of guilt when we say “no” to our husbands. It happened to me the other night, as Justin and I were laying in bed. He rolled to his side, and looked at me with hopeful, almost expectant eyes. A gentle smile was on his lips. After he’d asked the question, I sighed and closed my eyes as the wave of guilt washed over me. “I’m sorry,” I said, “but I don’t think now is the right time to buy another machine tool for the shop.”

I could tell he was disappointed, so I tried valiantly to support my response with reason so I didn’t appear too callous. I reminded him that in the past 10 months, he’d purchased a Schaublin lathe, a Craftex mill, and a surface grinder, not to mention the various tooling additions needed to operate them. He’d also been generously gifted a tool and cutter grinder, and while that hadn’t cost any money, the time to drag these machines home and set them up for use was more than a small investment of precious hours. I also suggested that the point of owning these machines was not offer them a humble home in our garage, but rather to make something with them.

As Justin conceded that I might have a small point to support my argument, I opened my eyes. Surprised to see him getting dressed, I asked where he was going. “To make some chips,” he replied, as though it should be obvious. “These machines had better start earning their keep.”