When I was growing up, my widowed mother would occasionally announce (as she juggled far too many arrangements, schedules, and shopping trips) that she needed a wife. Occasionally, she would map out a new dating life, predicated on whatever our greatest need was at the moment (busted car? “I need a boyfriend who’s a mechanic!”).
I, however, am married. Dude isn’t dead, so bringing a wife in would just complicate matters, and dating strikes me as a solution ill-fit to our lives at this stage. I’m just going to have to start hiring people.
First: Someone who knows where all the clothes go. I don’t love doing the laundry, but you know: Ok. The husband brings it down, I sort, put it through the machines, bring it up, he folds, and then the boy brings the piles to their appropriate rooms, putting his own in drawers. The husband is equally speedy with his own pile. I, however, take days to entirely put away the piles I’m responsible for, which amount to three, with three sub-piles: Mine, the girl’s, and the linens — subpiled thusly: Towels, sheets, table linens. Days, I’m telling you, days, at which point, I may well have started the newest round of washing.
Second: Someone who knows where all the food goes and will also impart to my brain telepathically what they’ve done with it. This one is particularly tricky, because about, oh, I don’t know, 43% of the time, the husband actually puts away the groceries in my stead, and that’s very nice indeed. I don’t know why, but I really hate putting away the groceries, so when he just walks into the kitchen and takes over, I am quite genuinely delighted.
BUT:
- He occasionally puts things in the wrong places, aka, the places I would never think to put them, and
- If I don’t do the putting away, I often forget that I’ve done the buying (not, you know, the entire trip to the store — just one or two particular items. So I’ll be all “Oh, damn, I can’t make that thing that is one of the five things that everyone in my family will eat because we don’t have the stuff!” Only to find the stuff later that night).
Which leads me to – Third: Someone who knows the five things that everyone in my family will eat and will come to my house to make those things. I was never a gourmet, or a foodie, or whatever, but I was a pretty fair cook, who more than occasionally enjoyed the process. I would even seek out and try new recipes! I know!
And then I had children. (Who, it should be noted, I love more than life itself).
The-having-of-children led to at least three things that get in the way of my sorta-foodie status: Lack of time, lack of energy, and lack of options. Oh, oh! And a fourth thing: You never get to choose not to.
These dang kids, they need to eat, actual meals, three times a day! And if we don’t manage to arrange that, they get ornery! I have this crazy notion that we should all eat more or less the same thing for supper (and supper only!), but, hemmed in by my first-born’s neo-phobia (yes, it’s a thing, and while he’s mostly over it now, you can catch up with the rest of the class here) — I quickly found myself with a very short list of dinners that work for everyone. That list has expanded a bit, but I’ll tell you what: I do get sick of it. I keep trying to institute a rule that once a week I get to make whatever I actually want to eat, but this always falls apart when I consider that, no matter what, I will still have to feed the damn children.
Fourth: Someone who will read my newspapers and will also impart to my brain telepathically what they say. I am a newsprint gal. I love the feel of newspapers, the rattle of the pages, the smell of the ink. When I was 11 years old, I delivered the Chicago Daily News, and when that venerable institution folded, the Chicago Tribune (come to think of it, perhaps I should have taken that as a sign). I went on to write for a number of papers, off and on, for many years, and I will subscribe to the Chicago Tribune until Zell’s antics + the death of print result in its inevitable burial.
It’s just that lately I never actually read it.
I don’t know why (why does one particular thing become that thing you never find the time for?), but the papers stay in their plastic sleeves for days and days until I finally open five or ten of them at a time (really), and go through them randomly, often concentrating almost exclusively on the comics.
But I refuse to drop the subscription, so it would be really, really helpful if someone could do the reading for me.
Fifth: Someone who will intuit when I need to get my car looked at, and will do it for me. I am always nervous that something’s wrong, have no faith in my ability to determine if that something is worthy of a look-see, and am forever confident that the guy in the shop is either missing the real problem, or ripping me off.
If only my mom had started dating that mechanic — they would be married by now, and I would be totally set! Why do mothers never consider the needs of their children?
Damn it.
i need an assistant like that too! i hate putting laundry away. fucking hate it. it usually ends up in a pile by the bed.
And then it falls over and ceases to be folded and gets caught up with the clothes I dropped on the floor when I got into bed and…
Yes. I know this problem.
My picky child tried to ruin my foodie status too and succeeded for a number of years. But no more. For the last couple of years (she’s 12 now), my husband and I make what we want to make for dinner, occasionally indulging our somewhat adventurous palates, and if the kid doesn’t like it, tough shit.
She knows how to make a grilled cheese sandwich and heat up a can of soup. There is always fruit available (which she likes, thank god). But if she turns her nose up at what we cook, she’s on her own now. Our faces will probably grace a book cover one day next to a vintage copy of Mommie Dearest. So be it.
I’m with Betty Cracker, whatever is made for dinner is dinner. If you don’t like it, find something else and cook it yourself, I’m not a short order cook. Lather, rinse, repeat as needed. BTW, it’s not just the kids that can be PITAs, DH is an absolute Eeeyore about anything new or different, and has some serious food prejudices. I used to try to work around him, but lately I just make what I make.
Lady, at least you have a guy who’ll do something in the house. As the sole breadwinner, sole chore doer, sole cook and sole person actually fumbling her way through home maintenance projects in a halfassed fashion, I would give my eye teeth for a guy who’ll actually start laundry and put away the food after the shopping. Bonus if he looks like Elijah Woods. And has his bank account.
As far as the food stuff, my mom had the perfect solution to that. You cook. At twelve, when I came home, I had to clean the kitchen, season the chicken, get that into the oven, start the rice and prepare a vegetable. By the time you’re done, whatever is cooked seems perfectly fine. Luckily, my current partner is very good about eating anything and everything I make. Unluckily, I’d like to come home after work and there’s fricking meal ready for once.
You have daughters? In west indian land, that’s your set of assistants right there. This is why you’re supposed to have them first.