Tuesday, October 13, 2015

The Way We Live, Part One

I spent the entire day today flat hunting. I suppose anything to do with house buying, renting, or moving is exhausting, so today was no exception. There is the added frustration of this being an extremely fast moving, competitive market. So you might see something you love in the morning, only to have it sold out from under you in the evening.

My husband hates flat hunting with an almost obsessive passion, so I have been commissioned to do the leg work, and only present him with the absolute cream of the crop. Which suites me because, tiring as it is, I love anything to do with houses.

As I was zooming around today, meeting one agent after an other, I was grateful that I was in fact able to do such a thing. I wasn't viewing flats after an exhausting, full day of work, or on the weekend and interrupting our down time. It was during the day, and I had the whole of it at my disposal to bop from place to place.

I only work part time - a maximum of about twenty hours a week - and this is, to be honest, only because I enjoy it, and I want to keep building up my skills and challenging myself.

This was a very conscious choice that we made together, as a couple. I was offered a full time job in the summer, and another offer seems just around the corner. And while each offer is tempting, I really love the choice we have made.

My husband has a stressful, very busy job. He loves it and is very good at it, but it asks a lot of him. He travels almost bi-weekly for a day or two or three at a time, and goes through seasons of needing to go to networking events in the evenings.

And so, if I know he is going to be out in the evening or is going to be away for a few days, I will try to meet him for lunch near his office. Occasionally, if I don't have a work or volunteer commitment, I will join him on a work trip. I have the flexibility to do these things - purposefully - and we need it this way so that we can actually spend quality time together.

I try to take care of anything extraneous going on in our lives so that the weekends are purely for relaxation and seeing friends, and not spent rushing around doing errands that couldn't get done during the work-week.

When he gets home dinner is prepared, he can escape his suit, and then we can eat and chat about the day and maybe watch a show together. If we have dry-cleaning to be dropped off, we don't have to worry about WHEN that is going to happen, or about trying to get there before closing, because I will take care of it during opening hours. The fridge is always stocked with fresh vegetables from the market, the table always has a bowl of fruit,  there are always some cookies in a jar for his sweet-tooth and for anyone who stops by for tea, and generally things are in their places, easy to be found when they are needed.

I can hear wails starting about how our feminist foremothers fought so that I wouldn't have to tend to my home. And so they did. But the key there is the "have;" it is perhaps more accurate to say that they fought so I could actively choose to live my life this way, and not have it as my only option.

Think of it like this: you get married in order to build a home together. Why not make it as pleasant as possible? If you are not tending to that life within your home, and working to make it a place where you actually want to live, then why did you get married? What is wrong with a practical division of labour, so that your lives together are actually enjoyable, instead of a frantic blur?

I think of the alternative. We both rush out of the house in the morning, and then back into it in the evening. The bed is probably unmade, possibly with a wet towel dampening up the mattress; there might be half drunk coffee on the counter and dirty dishes piled in the sink. We might have to put a load of laundry on, or maybe hang the laundry that was left moulding in the washing machine all day. We would have to figure out who is going to make dinner -  that is, if there are even any groceries available with which to make it. It might be about nine o'clock by this time, and do we really want to head out to the grocery store? And so we order food in, regretfully, knowing that we really should be eating a bit better, but with no energy or time to make it happen.

If there is no one whose job it is to take care of those things, then everything is wedged in between working hours. The reality, as much as we act as if houses and meals take care of themselves, is that in order for the home to function well, a series of little jobs must be taken care of. And this is work. And someone has to do it. If there is no one taking care of these jobs during the working day, you must do them out of work hours. But I suppose that is what evenings and weekends are for.

No wonder the divorce rate is so high; instead of spending focused time together, one person is at the grocery store, and the other is changing the sheets because - EWW - when were they changed last?

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The other day, as he was getting ready for bed, apropos of nothing really, my husband said he was really glad we had organized our lives as we have. He has just changed jobs, and it has been a stressful transition. He insists that the reason he survived it with energy to spare is because I make him eat vegetables and lots of protein - a far cry from his bachelor habit of opening a can of whatever was on his shelf and heating it in the microwave.

And so he said the sweetest thing - that it is only because I am behind the scenes supporting him and taking care of everything else, that he is able to do as well he does; that he sees his work life as a genuine team effort, with me making sure is always able to be in control of the ball and score.

The way we live is a genuine team effort geared towards building an enjoyable home life and a united relationship. And interestingly, that has rather far reaching effects.

But that is a post for another time.


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