My Response to My Response to The Good Wife Guide
Sigh. Smarty-pants disorganized housewives with attitude. Aren’t you just sick of them and their complaining? On occasion I after blogging I’ll read the featured blog on WordPress. Today’s just p***ed me off so I am taking valuable housework time to get it all out before I get an ulcer. Maybe it was written to be funny but I just found it sad, given that yet another of my gender seems to be bashing away at an institution that just needs to be recognized as a viable life choice or, better yet, left alone so we can get on with it.
NB: Bold face is the paraphrased start of each rule of the ‘Guide’ (of questionable origins).
Have dinner ready. Plan ahead Stop right there – plan the meals together the weekend before — this takes ten minutes tops and can be done at breakfast. Have a few fast/Plan B meals always in reserve for when he is going to be late. Give him steak every night if he wants. After a week, it’ll be back to once a week. Problem sorted.
Prepare yourself. Well, I don’t wear makeup (waste of money and time) but do hit the shower at 3:30-4PM every weekday after doing all my house, garden, writing, DIY work. No different that doing it in the morning after he leaves.
Be…more interesting. Good jokes, interesting factoids picked up online or in the news work well. Tomorrow’s weather report also a good one to relay so he knows if he’ll need to leave early for work the next day. How much skin has you lost of your nose for doing this?
Clear away the clutter. This is good housekeeping, not good wife practice per se. A place for everything and everything in its place.
Gather up schoolbooks, etc. See above. Lay out his work clothes and cufflinks for the next day so you can have an extra few minutes in bed together at 6AM and have casual clothes ready to change into at the end of the day. Help with the latter. Make sure you haven’t started the supper lest it burn on the stove/in the oven. (FYI – coming up for 18 years of wedded bliss. On that note, never say no. It won’t kill you).
Prepare and light fire…. In absence of fireplace, turn up heat in house fifteen minutes before he gets home because you have turned it down and worn a sweater during the day because you do not like a warm house. Since you have trained him to call before he leaves work and checked traffic conditions online you will know when to do this.
Prepare children. N/A, but when we get a puppy I will make sure he or she is clean so he or she can be cuddled right away. That’s the best I can do.
Be happy to see him. Sit on the front step in the warmer months and keep an eye out for him in the colder months (easy to do, since you’ve trained him to call and checked the traffic conditions and know roughly when he’ll arrive) so you can open the garage door. Of course, if I had a salary I could buy him a garage door opener, but then I’d have to move my car out of the drive anyway since I’d have to buy a car to get to work. I’d need to work to afford a car….
Warm smile, etc on return. Are there women who don’t do this? What absolute cows!
Listen. Or just leave him alone for fifteen or twenty minutes so he can decompress.
Make evening his. You get the house to yourself ALL DAY LONG. Don’t like sports or reality telly? Sit with him anyway with a basket of handwork. Don’t do handwork? Learn something or surf ridiculous WordPress blogs.
Your goal: try to make sure your home is a place of peace, order and tranquillity where husband can renew himself body and spirit. And you want a chaotic, shambling mess of a house WHY?
Don’t greet him with complaints or problems. Same reply as warm smile above. Sheesh.
Don’t complain when he is late for dinner. See first tip. And be glad he is not pasted to a telephone pole at the side of the road. RIP Nick.
…take off his shoes. Or train him to take then off when he enters the house. (Not necessary to spend two years in Hong Kong and assorted Asian locations to achieve this).
Asking questions and questioning judgements. He makes and handles the money because that’s what he is an expert at. I do everything else, including spending it. Simple division of labour, which so-called modern couples always seem to fecht over.
A good wife always knows her place. Right by the side of a good husband.
Now, go shine his shoes or bake him some brownies. But first, read the (faux) Guide online and adapt it to make YOUR marriage and house the wonderful place it can be if you lose the attitude and buy a book on organizing your life (and another, if you need it, for child control. A good swat worked for my — lipstick-less — Mom and she has three very successful, reasonably happy children not permanently damaged by some discipline).
I’m going to go dig in my frozen garden now. No, I need to assemble a lasagne first (which can be frozen for tomorrow if he works late tonight).