Maria started mumbling about the living room walls this week. Hey, she said, what do you think about painting some of the walls in the living room this weekend? Well, I said, okay, if  you want to do it.

I had seen her staring at the walls, I could hear the wheels turning in that busy head.

What color do you think, she asked?

I smiled (to myself), I’ve been this route before, I know the drill, I may be of limited usefulness, but I am not stupid. Oh, whatever you think, I say.

But what color do you like, she asks? She looked quite sincere. She was just kidding.

For fun, I toss out the first thing I think of. Purple? She pretends to think about it. I know she has it all worked out in her head.

She smiles, turns away. There are four walls in the living room, of course, which gets a lot of natural light. One wall was just painted salmon pink, the other three are white. Maria has targeted these walls as being dull.

The white walls will change as sure as the grass will grow.

I know on Saturday we will be going to the hardware store, mixing paints. I know she will spend a good chunk of the weekend zipping around the living room like a fiend, moving ladders around, hopping up and down, she will talk about how long it will take, how complex it will be, how much she dislikes doing it.

I will nod, rather stupidly. She is not telling the truth.

It will all be done Sunday afternoon. It will look great. There will be the obligatory fussing about the color, the obligatory pretending to ask me what I think, the obligatory pretending to listen.

This is the tyranny of the artist. I am not one of those men who thinks he can handle tools and paint and gutters and such. I can’t pick colors or figure out what goes together.

I don’t want to, and I can’t. I can handle typing and walking and hauling some hay around, and yelling at dogs. And reading, I can handle reading, and sometimes British mysteries on the Ipad from Netflix.

And I can shop and I can cook most meals. That’s not bad, but it’s all I can do. I am just not interested in the other stuff.

I think one key to a good marriage is understanding when to run and hide, and when to fight, and also accepting what you can and can’t do. I have little or no male ego about repairs, and the artist loves hard labor, as long as it’s of her choosing and is somewhat artistic.

Okay by me. Make it work for you.

Maria handles the heavy stuff, all construction and repair issues, all restoration. She talks to the plumbers and the handymen. I am not trusted to do this. I wouldn’t put it that way to her, of course, she always pretends to care what I think, sort of, she always asks me what I think, and once, a few years ago, she even accepted one of my suggestions.

One of my Facebook readers messaged me some suggestions for Maria’s Fiber Chair, “tell her to string some fiber across the back,” and I almost lost my breakfast. I messaged her back. “Umm, as a rule, i do not tell Maria how to do her art. If you want to try, here’s her e-mail.”

The woman was not heard from again.

Yesterday, Maria said we should go to the hardware store together to look at colors. Fine, I said. In the afternoon, she showed up with two paper samples (above) and said, “what do you think about green?”

I thought we were going together, I mumbled. “Oh, really?,” she said, “well I was just driving by the hardware store.”

“How about mauve?,” I offered mischievously, as she held the samples up to the wall. I have some pride.

“So you agree,” she said. “This light green?”

“Yes, sure,” I said. “Looks great.”

During this next restoration phase, I will be permitted to paint for a half-hour or so (no edges, and lots of tarps beneath me) and at some point, I will be lavishly praised for my 20 strokes, and then she will suggest I go blog or take a photo and I will be dismissed, and I will go blog and photo.

Usually she’ll say, “why don’t you rest a bit, you looked tired.” After that, there will be no looking back, my brushing is done.

So looks like we’re going to go with light green to offset the new salmon pink North Wall. Stay tuned.

I love living with an artist, but I will tell you they all have a bit of Putin in them. Don’t cross them when it comes to colors, don’t make too many comments or suggestions while they work, never, ever try to tell them what to do.  Learn to say “that’s a great idea.” Life goes better that way.

Now that I think of it, those are the same rules for living with a writer.