Peter Lyons: Let's hear it for being idle at home

Those with no interest in home maintenance are often subjected to unfortunate comments. Photo / Getty Images

Opinion

here are many more worthwhile things to be inscribed on your epitaph than `spent his life mowing lawns'.

We are a conservative society. Minority groups with abnormal inclinations are often frowned upon. Those of us with no interest in home improvements or maintenance are regularly subjected to unfortunate comments and dreadful television programmes that suggest we lack a key ingredient of Kiwi masculinity.

As someone uninterested in the difference between a Gib board and an ironing board, I would like to make a stand for this misunderstood minority. The Kiwi way implies a love of rugby, booze, barbecues and DIY. The first three make some sense to me as worthwhile pursuits. I could cope with "All Black legend, cooked a decent steak and liked a beer" on my tombstone. I couldn't see the point of "Spent his life wallpapering, renovating and mowing the lawns" as an epitaph.

I read a recent column where the writer suggested that her home handy woman skills had made her husband virtually obsolete. My thoughts were she had married a very shrewd guy and maybe she needed to work on her love life.

Major social change is a slow process. In the 1960s and 70s many Kiwis spent their weekends pottering around the house. My father spent long hours mowing lawns and trimming hedges and acquiring melanoma scars. That was when life was lived in black and white, before they invented colour. Now we have cafes, gyms, films, malls and restaurants of all ethnicities. We have bikes that are fun and fast to ride. We have Lycra to enhance the allure of middle-aged male cyclists. We have exercise shoes that don't shatter your knees or splint your shins. We have lattes and cappuccinos and bits of rice wrapped in seaweed. There is so much more to see and do on the weekend.

We live in a capitalist society. It is based on a wonderful technique called division of labour where people specialise in different jobs and pay others to do the jobs they don't want to do themselves. I teach economics in order to pay someone else to clean the house. In a perfect market economy it would be hoped that I teach economics better than she would. She definitely cleans better than I do. This is the huge benefit of specialisation and free trade. DIY is a terrible affront to this basic law of economics.

I used to mow the lawn. Being partially sighted, it resembled a drunk trying to shave himself with a broken beer bottle. The clumps of lawn that remained were littered with the white flecks of old dog turds I had plowed over. My lawn-mowing came to an end when I emulsified the neighbour's herb garden. We now employ a specialist in the art of lawn mowing.

There is an implicit belief that there is something manly in home renovations and maintenance. I remember being monotonised at a dinner party by a handy bloke recounting the joys of constructing his own deck. When he finally finished he asked me what I had done over the weekend. I said I had read a good book, done a bit of writing and dined with friends. His eyebrows arched. I was tempted to open a beer bottle with one of my remaining teeth just to reassert my masculinity.

I have entered a handyman mega store just once in my life. I was on a pub crawl and mistook the blue signage for a Speights bar. The barbecue season can be difficult due to the occasional bore who seems to think others will have an interest in his renovation selfies. Most people offer appreciative gestures and then lament the ghastly makeshift job on the way home.

It takes all sorts. Some wish to spend their valuable leisure time on home renovations and maintenance. In the Middle Ages some people loved birching themselves and sitting on pedestals in the scorching desert sun to prove their worth. People should be allowed to do whatever they want in their short mortal span, provided it harms no other. There are many ways to live a good life.

Peter Lyons teaches Economics at St Peters College in Epsom.