One Saturday morning my wife awoke and realized that our house was too small for our growing family. She said it had something to do with the three children who climbed into our bed in the middle of the night. I told her we needed a bigger bed. She told me we needed another bedroom. I told her we could get a few roll-a-way beds. She told me that if she didn’t get a new room built onto the side of the house I would be sleeping in the roll-a-way bed. End of discussion.

I soon showered and dressed for a trip to the local hardware store. I didn’t shave because I needed to fit in with all the contractors. When I arrived at the city block known as Loads Depot I saw other poor husbands slowly streaming into the store. We were all unshaven and unkept. We knew we could not change our destiny. Every man had a "honey do" list clinched in his hand. We all knew there were baseball games to watch . . . but not today. There were kites to fly, but not today. There were sacks of potato chips to eat, but not today – well, maybe this afternoon.

After I entered the store, my demeanor changed. I was in plywood paradise. I was Dorothy in the land of Oz. The store shelves skied above me filled with contractor candy. There were bolts, and nails, and boards, and power tools. I knew that I had died and gone to heaven. The only question was how much I could get on the budget of an accountant. I pulled out my check book to see my balance. It wasn’t near enough.

It was at this time that I saw a stand filled with credit card applications. "Get 10% off of your entire first purchase," read the sign. I think the image had a theme song playing in the background.

I whipped out my pen and began filling out the questions. To my surprise, there were only a few lines of information required. "First and last name," read the first line. "Name of first born son," read the second. It was so easy.

With the application filled out, I went to the credit window and received a credit line of $25 million dollars at 27% interest. "No problem," I thought. "I’ll pay it off before the interest hits."

I then searched across the store for a cart. Immediately in front of the entry doors I saw a hand basket. I snickered just a little. "Like that will do!"

A few feet further away I saw a shopping cart. "Better," I thought. And in the distance, radiating with the warmth of the morning son, I saw a six foot flatbed eight wheeler pull wagon. Once again the shopping theme song started playing. "Perfect." I began to hum along.

Soon I was going up and down the aisles pulling my cart gleefully and lifting home improvement products off the shelves from both the left and the right. I choreographed a little dance that I proudly call "Depot Despot." I am certain they got it on the security cameras and will soon be broadcast nationally on Reality Video.

After three hours of shopping, I had filled my pull cart to the brim. The cash register attendant just smiled and congratulated me on my new charge account and the incredible savings I had received. I smiled in return, knowing I had just bought enough building material to construct the world’s second Sears Tower.

When I arrived home, I unloaded my materials onto the back porch. It was a monument to my manhood. Just looking at it made my testosterone flame. As I looked around I thought I had everything I needed to build my new room. But when I started looking for my hammer to break into my exterior wall, I remembered that I had lost it on the last Father and Son’s outing. I needed a hammer.

Rather than following my impulse to immediately return to the home improvement store, I decided to take a break and eat lunch. And that led to me watching my favorite baseball team. And that led me to eating potato chips on the couch. And that led me to vacuuming the mess and then it was night time.

One year later, all that construction material still looks good, stacked in a heap on my back porch. It is a room in the making. It is a vision waiting for a seer. Waiting for a hammer. 

Of course, my wife gave me a hammer for my birthday recently. We all had a good laugh. My wife wasn’t laughing nearly as hard as I was.