No doubt about

it, the man has improved with the years. One of us had to.

There was a

time when I thought I was the far more saintly one. Sure enough, I did.

Time and the grace of God teaches us so much.

But let's not

discuss my lack of sainthood. I'd rather talk about how my hubby seems

to be achieving more and more patience, tolerance, longsuffering, and

all those wonderful elusive attributes that most of us only hope to some

day possess.

For sure he

has me beat at the present time. And I think I can give you an example

of how it may have happened.

For instance...

We have this

white arbor that we placed about 30 or 40 feet down into the woods behind

the house. We set it up on what appeared to be a natural winding trail

that leads down to the creek.

I liked it

there. At first. For quite a while, really. Maybe two years. Then I began

to imagine how it would look if it were moved over to the left a few dozen

feet and lined up with my back door. Such alignment would mean that we

would need to create another trail into the woods and down to the creek.

Another natural looking trail, of course.

I spoke often

of how nice it would be to stand at the back door and look out at the

edge of the woods and have the beautiful white arbor there in perfect

alignment with a myriad of other things I have persuaded him to do for

me in the back yard.

I repeatedly

imagined aloud how I would so enjoy the way my eye would be drawn down

into the woods if that lovely white arbor was just positioned just so....

Never once

has he threatened to have the home and garden channel disconnected, or

to cancel any of my gardening magazine subscriptions.

On the contrary,

just last week, right smack dab in the middle of turkey season, he went

out, cranked up his tractor and started to work on this latest project.

Now you would

think I would have had sense enough to stay out of his way and carry iced

tea out to him every now and then, and ooh and ahh appropriately and just

be soooo appreciative.

But no, I decided

it was time I learned how to operate the tractor. And help him.

So there he

was, all bent over, tugging and chopping at poison ivy vines and a great

variety of roots that kept emerging from heaven only knows where and what,

when I decided to climb up on the seat of his John Deere.

When he heard

the first pathetic effort I made to put it in gear he wheeled around with

the strangest expression I suppose I had ever seen.

Ever so sweetly,

he asked what I was doing, but the look on his face did not match the

sugary sound of his voice. It was a bit more like maybe I had stolen eggs

from the henhouse and he was afraid I might drop them if he startled me.

"I want

to move some dirt, what do I do first?" I asked.

"Push

in the clutch."

With great

ease I did so.

"Now put

it in gear."

No problem.

"Now move

the lever to raise the bucket," he said. And yes, he told me which

way. Up or down or left or right. And he explained how, in detail, over

and over, but I didn't get it then, and I don't remember now.

That's when

his sainthood began to be apparent. With all the scraping I did over a

period of 30 minutes or so ­ and it wasn't ground I was scraping

never once did he yell at me.

I finally gave

up and crawled down after I stuck the front tires in a deep rut I did

manage to create. He tried to soothe me and assure me it would just take

practice. Not even a hint of "I dare you to ever climb up there again."

Instead, he

worked until dark dragging and smoothing and raking and trying to open

up the new "natural" path that I wanted.

The next afternoon

he worked on it for another couple of hours until I pronounced that it

was just right.

Then we went

to get the white arbor and move it to its new location. We attempted to

line it up perfectly with my back door and porch steps and...

With the seventh

move he walked away. "When you decide where you want this thing you

let me know and I will come move it one more time."

Not hardly.

Inch by inch I'll wiggle and jiggle it until I have it where I want it.

Even sainthood has its limits.

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