My Metro Jethro

Every good blogger it seems has a secret, pet name for her husband, so I feel obligated to cleverly represent mine. I heard a shtick on satellite radio last week about "Metro Jethro," and it struck me how much I am married to that man.

He owns pink dress shirts, but he dipped Copenhagen for over a decade. He has a definite opinion on wall color and upholstery fabrics, but he adores threadbare t-shirts and -- recently -- flip-flops. If it has pipes, electricity, or gas involved, he can likely fix it, but he is always the guy you want when you've lost something; he is entirely gifted at looking for things -- patient and resolute. He knows tools better than the marketing director at Craftsman, but, with rapt attention, he will watch The Bachelor with me.

If you are one of Metro's golf buddies, let me add that, always after watching such a show, he resignedly shakes his head at why he did it. He is simultaneously unsure and totally certain of his motivation -- an emotion that any married being experiences at some point, it seems.

I took this shot in October, 2004. It is Metro's hand with my two boys' hands. Sweet. Beautiful. And, now, so long ago, it seems. Heartbreaking. Encouraging.

On a side note, that deck that appears beneath their hands in this picture has since been burned. Literally. In a bon fire at the back of our 1 1/2 acres of drought-stricken paradise. It seems we liked the deck, but termites liked it better. Then, the deck wood soon became a mere connecting flight to our house. Someday, I'll explain how we discovered -- and kept at bay -- those rascally, little creatures. Noah should have, perhaps, made that one ommission on the ark. Just saying.

I took this shot one spring when I was planning something really cool for Mother's Day. This is Metro and his brother, Just Jethro... Jethro minus the metro. I think, from the descriptions, you can tell who is who in the photo. I never did make that cool gift for their mom, but, knowing these guys as I do, I have always thought the picture filled with a certain poignancy -- a certain clarity of their spirits. I am thinking about how they are following similar but iconically different paths and how the goats are symbolic of... Wait. I lost focus. Remind me to stay on topic here: It's just a cool picture.

Metro Jethro is a man's man and a gal's pal -- and a pretty nifty life partner.