OK, fine, I admit it. I am not the perfect pick-up-your socks-as-they-fall-off-your-feet, keep-a-scented-candle-burning kind of wife. I let the laundry go until the weekend… and then sometimes only do enough to scrape through the week with clean socks and underwear. Crumbs on a counter don’t bother me. I can rinse out a dirty coffee cup and fill it right back up. But when I find a lead buried in a thesis paragraph I am in a tizzy. Randomly guess on multiple choice questions and I am out of my mind. This is how I ended up rewriting Rich’s homework assignment on a Sunday night, while he moved about the house organizing and washing dishes. It was supposed to be the other way around. And I know he was mad at me because he moved through the house at warp speed- scrubbing down counters and throwing day-old baked goods in the trash. When I heard him downstairs doing laundry, I knew it was serious. After a good 45 minutes, during which time I had rewritten his paper and begun to edit a second, he tossed himself on the couch and said, “Why don’t I just quit my job and stay home then, if all I’m good for is cleaning.” Wait, isn’t that my line? Aren’t I supposed to be the one annoyed at housework and feeling less than valuable? I never know what to do in these circumstances.
The truth is, if I were to do the cleaning, it would take me twice as long and wouldn’t look half as good. And if he were to edit his own papers, or worse- have me sit there and explain every edit and grammatical error, not only would we be up all night, I would inevitably end up making him feel stupid and we’d both walk away angry.
How do you love a wife who’s no good at cleaning, or encourage a husband who can’t write a decent research paper? It may sound silly, but this is something that we are seriously working on. I tell him that we truly are the other part to each other that makes up a whole. But what if you don’t like the part you are- or worse, the part your partner is?
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