Southern Thing Column

Husbands don’t have to understand monograms and throw pillows, right?

Below is an excerpt from this week’s column for It’s a Southern Thing. Click here to go to the full column now, or click the link at the end of the excerpt. (For those who are curious, I share the excerpt not because it tickles me to redirect you to the full column but because the column is the property of but I share part of it here so readers who follow the blog will know it has been posted.)

My husband would never, ever approach a monogram shop. Monograms don’t make sense to him. Sweetums has never felt a need to mark his territory and, if he did, a Sharpie would do just as well without making the towels all stiff with embroidery backing.

Likewise, he’s never asked me to pretty-please-with-sugar-on-top put more tiny animal figurines on the mantle. And if I asked his opinion on a lime wash, he’d probably say it depends on if the limes were dirty.

Sweetums doesn’t have any patience for ruffles or sequins or frou-frou anything that emphasizes form over function. (He swears his Bigfoot statuettes have a function, y’all. I mean besides just getting on my last nerve.)

There is a gaping divide in how Sweetums and I think of décor. I want the house to look nice. He wants the house to make sense. For example, he doesn’t understand throw pillows. Why would otherwise sensible people create an obstacle course that must be completed to reach the ultimate goal, which is the bed or a cushy sofa? Especially when, generally speaking, someone who is trying to get to a bed or sofa is already tired.

So I do my best to choose non-contentious décor. It doesn’t always work. The other day, I put out new deck chair cushions for a Memorial Day cookout. While my friend and daughter complimented them, Sweetums just looked at them quizzically. “Why is there a wooden button in the center of the pillow?” he asked.

Wha … huh?

I don’t know why there’s a wooden button in the center of the cushion. How could I possibly know why there’s a wooden button in the center of the cushion? Why is the sky blue? Why do toilets have lids? Why are biscuits round when they would have more bites if they were square?

There is no logical reason to put a wooden button in the center of a pillow unless you plan to attach it to something else, say the front of your blouse, your dog’s sweater, or a parachute pack … maybe as extra padding, just in case the ripcord fails. All I know is, someone somewhere decided this cushion needed a button in the center and I’m good with that. But Sweetums needs a reason. Read the full column here.

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