Some Pig

Credit Where Credit Is Due

So, as threatened, I stormed through the kids' crap like the Huns thundering across the Mongolian plains, wreaking order from chaos wherever I went.  Not only that, but I did laundry, ran errands, finished the week's grocery shopping, bought Christmas cards, AND set up Sunday night's dinner in the crock pot.  By 7 p.m., I was sitting down in front of the TV to fill out cards; by 9:30, I was tucked up in bed.  The house, I might add, was immaculate.  If I took something out,  I put it back.  If I dirtied it, I cleaned it.  If it needed folding or storing or filing or recycling, I folded or stored or filed or recycled it.  The house was an oasis of serenity and calm.

Fast-forward 24 hours later.   We had just finished dinner, the remnants of which were smeared across the plates that stood stacked in the sink waiting to be washed.  The counter was strewn with pieces of the mixer, waiting for Warren to replace the stripped gears and reassemble it so he could START making the bread for the next day's sandwiches.  Celeste had recreated a Jackson Pollack painting out of chicken and dumplings  on the dining room table, while her sister screeched about some transgression, real or imaginary, that we all had committed against her.  The day's outfits were scattered the length of the hall, next to the damp towels left on the floor. Yet another load of unfolded laundry sat in the living room, while stacks of folded, clean laundry teetered on top of every bureau.  At regular intervals, the dog got up, shuffled across the floor, and slumped back down with a heavy sigh, just to let us all know that, sheesh, some of us need to go outside to go potty, yanno.  Needless to say, the Zen-like calm that permeated the premises 24 hours previously?  Was gone.  Or more like, annihilated. 

That's when I realized something:  IT'S NOT ME;  IT'S THEM.  They are the reason why our house always looks like a documentary about the aftermath of a natural disaster!  It's no wonder I sound like one of the adults in a Charlie Brown tv special when I have to say the same damn things every damn day about fifteen gajillion times!  Pick up your clothes.  Pick up your books.  Pick up your laundry.  Pick up your damp towels.   Please don't leave your stuff there.  Please put your plate in the sink.  Please don't antagonize your sister.  Please do what I just asked you to do instead of making me repeat it until my head blows up.  Please just do whatI ask you to do the first time I ask you to do it, instead of engaging in huge philosophical and teleological debates about why you have to do everything, anyway.  Because you know who's really doing everything?  ME, that's who!  And if ya keep asking, I'll be more than glad to give some of it to YOU. 

So, in a way, I'm actually heartened by this turn of events.  Why?  Because it proves beyond a shadwo of a doubt -  It's not me, it's them.  This means I get carte blanche to ignore all the chaos and clutter hanging around the happy halls of my home, because, hey!  That ain't MY mess!  If you can't find your stuff anymore because the level of disorganization is unlivable, well, good luck and vaya con Dios, cuz I ain't helping ya. 

And with that, I believe I have a date with my pillow and a nice, lengthy book. 

Oh, Silent Night

At this very moment, guess what is happening?

My husband is in the car, on his way to visit my parents.

My children are in the car, on their way to visit my parents.

My dog is in the car, on his way to visit my parents.

You know who is not in the car? 

ME.  I am not in the car!  I am not on the way to visit my parents!

And you know what?

That is just fine by me.

When my darling husband, who is too wonderful for words, mentioned that it would be nice to see my parents before the holiday rolled around, all I could think of was all the eleventy jillion chores, errands, and tasks that would get pushed off yet again, only to be added to the next weekend's already-burgeoning to-do list, and it was all I could do not to sob.  Plus, I had been invited to a coworker's party, and every time I get invited to do something social with other grownup friends, it gets pre-empted by one family-centric obligation or another.  So, feeling both guilty and truculent, I took a stand. 

"I'm not going," I announced, preparing for a - well, not a fight, really, but a prolonged negotiation session.

"That's okay," said my hubs, who is too wonderful for words, and he proceeded apace with plans to go without me.  And whole vistas of me-centric behaviors are now open to explore!  To wit:

I get to listen to Christmas music featuring original instruments from the 1700's, not the original cast of the PBS show Arthur.

I get to fall asleep, stay asleep, and wake up by myself, on my own, without anyone needing a drink of water, a cuddle, help falling asleep, or someone to close their door. 

I get to spend an entire weekend without being woken up at 4 a.m. by Murphy the Co-dependent Dog, who prefers going on his 5 a.m. walks with me at the other end of the leash.  (Thanks, mother's instincts, for gracing me with the ability to wake up on a dime as soon as I hear him shuffle down the hall, the way I used to snap awake when the baby cried.  Murphy's figured that out and uses that like a weapon against me.  Damn it.)

I get to spread out on the couch and correct papers the way I like, without having to move my stuff, answer a question, referee a fight, or worry about any interruptions other than our paper-loving cat trying to sit on the papers - the uncorrected ones, of course.

I get to watch History Boys, which I have been dying to see, instead of hiding from Breaking Bad, which Warren loves and I absolutely cannot watch. 

I get to indulge in ALL my naughty, illicit pleasures AT ONCE.  Like turning the heat up to 65 and leaving it there!  Eating cereal any time of day!  Drowning everything in Thai peanut sauce!  Reading in bed without someone assuming that "still awake at 10 pm" equals "open for business"!  Listening to music on the computer in the kitchen, where I'm working, instead of on the stereo, which requires a traverse across the room and operating three different remotes, thanks to Captain Technology.  (That last one?  Makes him bonkers.)

There's a price to all this, of course.  I promised Warren I would march through the downstairs toy room like the wrath of God, and divest ourselves of a couple metric tons of outgrown and unloved toys before Santa dumps another sh!tton of crap on us.  (And yeah, I know, I know, but when you have the only two grandkids on one side of the family, they tend to get a little overly gifted at the holidays.) I have to deal with Christmas cards now, or they will never get done.  I have to sort out the contents of the girls' closets and figure out just what the heck they still can wear, what needs to be packed away, and what can get the heave-ho to the next family of small ones. 

Having said all that, I have to admit, things around here are a little... weird.  A little TOO peaceful.  Usually we spend our Friday nights in post-long-week-meltdown mode, with a lot of sibling squabbling, some mental anguish over figuring out what's for dinner, the dog shuffling around in the background and one of us playing the NewsHour at volume 11 like Nigel Tufnel (because you can't understand what Margaret Warner's saying about the latest euro crisis unless it's blasting through your head like an air raid siren, apparently).  Most Fridays, I catch myself thinking at least once that it would be nice if Calgon would show up and take me away, or better yet, take them away.  Who knew I'd actually miss it? 

(PS Don't worry - I'll struggle through somehow.)

In Which Several First-World Problems Collide

Okay, first, a disclaimer:  Every single thing I am about to share with you?  Is a first-world problem.  I know, I am thankful for all the many, many blessings I have of hearth, home, and health.  So lest you read this and think, sheesh, what a self-absorbed, shallow whiner, keep in mind:  I am a self-absorbed, shallow whiner with perspective!

The back story:  Several weeks ago, I happened to mention to Warren that I would like my own iPad because there are lots of cool educational apps out there I could use and it would be nice to have connectivity without having to lug my school laptop thither and yon (because another first world problem I have is that the school buys the cheap laptops, which are lunky and heavy).  

The back-back story:  Warren just bought himself a car.  It was a used car, and he got it for a good price, but the point is, this man LOVES buying cars and will buy one at the least provocation.  In the ten years we've been married, he has bought and sold six cars, many of which were purchased with what I consider to be marginal justification.  However, he loves the whole process.  He loves the hunt, he loves the wheeling-dealing, he loves fixing them up.  Since he is careful with our money and is a good husband and provider, my attitude has been, knock yourself out.  That means I have to endure participate in more discussions about torque and horsepower relative to frame size and differential slip than I ordinarily would (which is none), but if it makes him happy, then it makes me happy.

Meanwhile, I've discussed here before that what *I* like is small and sparkly and comes in carat weight. However, since my husband is relentlessly practical, and since jewelry admittedly has very little application in daily life unless you're using it as portable wealth, he has steadfastly ignored my subtle hints and oblique comments (e.g., "I'd love a diamond ring for our tenth anniversary!"). In his view, he had to get me a diamond in order to get engaged, and now that the necessity for diamond procurement is gone, so he is off the hook.  Whenever I point out that at least three of the car purchases we've made have been superfluous, at least technically, he gives lengthy justification for his actions that somehow manages to portray my acquiescence to this frequent car procurement as active participation in the process, and acceptance for the necessity thereof.  Which is a nice bit of barracks lawyering, as far as I'm concerned. 

Fast-forward back to the present moment.  A couple of days ago, I was tidying up way too late at night when Warren came in the kitchen.  "What color iPad do you want?" he asked, in the same tone of exasperation in which he'd say, "where is the checkbook," or "what do we need at the store?"

"Way to ruin the gift-giving experience," I replied. 

"Look, it's like ripping off a band-aid," he continued.  "Let's just get this over with."

!!!!!

?????

Um, exsqueeze me?????????  Let's just get this over with???????????  That's what he thinks about giving his loving wife a present - that it's an onerous chore to be disposed of as handily as possible? Isn't the point of giving a present that you WANT the other person to have something that they will like and appreciate, to show that you like and appreciate THEM?  If it's about the color of the iPad cover, after ten years of marriage, could he not make SOME kind of educated guess about what color I'd like?  For the love of Steve Jobs, when Warren got HIS iPad, he asked me to order him a cover and warned me sternly not to order a pink one, which you think would be a PRETTY SOLID CLUE which color I'd like, but even that is BESIDES THE POINT.  The point is, if he's going to get me an iPad as a GIFT, then how about choosing it for me based on the fact that he'd like me to have it instead of acting like it's some kind of obligation he can't get out of?  And now that I KNOW about it, it doesn't seem very GIFT-LIKE - would it have been all that hard to, oh, I don't know, buy it and wrap it and put it under the tree?  Now I don't even WANT the stupid iPad anyway, SO THERE.

[NB:  This is the point in the story where my ever-quotable coworker looked at me and said, "I hate you."  Then he took out a piece of paper and made a list:  "First-world problems - my husband got me an iPad."  Another coworker chimed in and said, "No - it's 'I don't want the iPad my husband got me.'"  And yeah, I deserve that, a little bit.]

So here's my argument:  Warren seems to feel perfectly justified in going out and procuring 'new" cars because it makes him happy.  Let's say that over the course of buying and selling all these cars, he's shelled out maybe $5k out of pocket that didn't get any kind of return on investment other than his increased happiness and satisfaction.  I consider that $5 grand well spent, in that case.  So if that's the case, and if the above scenario is indicative of his approach to gift-giving (which it is), then why the hell don't I just go out and buy myself the big-ticket item I'd like that he clearly is never going to get me?  $5,000 would buy a very nice ring, I do believe, and I wouldn't turn around and sell it in three years, either.

The Clothes Make the Man?

Recently my husband has turned over a new leaf.  No, he did not decide to ditch me for a younger, prettier, more-likely-to-remember-where-she-put-things model; although if he does, I totally do not blame him after the Great Car Key Incident of '09.  Anywhat, after forty-some years on this planet, he decided that he was going to make more of an effort, sartorially speaking - which is a fancy way of saying he's trying to dress better.  This is a little more difficult for men than one might imagine.  In days of yore, all a man had to do to dress well was throw on a suit and make sure his tie had no egg yolk stains or the like on it, and voila!  Well-dressed!  Now that suits and ties and even "business casual" have gone the way of the dinosaurs, it's a much more open-ended concept. 

In addition, Hubs happens to be a towering presence in my life in terms of personality, but not so much physically.  He's lean and wiry and has absolutely, positively no backside.  None.  Clearly his genetic makeup is much more refined than yours truly's is, because my sturdy peasant ancestors bequeathed me with the genes to store enough energy in my backside to outlast several famines.  It's not hard to see that Warren has no junk in the trunk when he wears typical khakis and jeans, because the hind end of his trousers looks like Santa's sack on Christmas morning.  With the clothes Warren used to buy, there was so much extra fabric hanging around his body, he could've made a tent and camped overnight.  Well, no more!  Warren went shopping with his most metrosexual friend, and my formerly Dockers-and-golf-shirts husband came back calling individual garments "pieces" and spouting phrases about "tapered fit" and "slim cut".  And the price tag??  Holy haberdashery, Batman!  As our friend Molly astutely noted, "When you start calling clothes 'pieces,' that's a hundred bucks per."  Considering I buy the majority of my clothes at thrift stores and consignment shops, I had to go sit down for a minute when he gave me the final tally. "But they'll last forever," he said to me defensively, to which I say, "Damn skippy, they're going to last forever, because at that price you are wearing them into your next life as well, bub."

Warren's new snappy duds have generated a positive response professionally; at least, a number of people outside his department have commented favorably.  The people inside his department wouldn't notice because Warren works in IT, a.k.a., the last refuge of the fashion-impaired.  I have seen coworkers of his sporting Fair Isle knit vests, for heaven's sake; they hardly qualify as arbiters of fashion.  This positive feedback is a welcome development, because the other side effect of Warren's new wardrobe is that laundry day has become a MUCH more complicated process chez Pig.  The laundress who handled Marie Antoinette's linens is as nothing on me.  (And before I get bombarded with let-him-do-his-own-damn-laundry comments, I need to note that Warren works absolutely insane hours at a grindingly difficult job to keep us living la vida loca here in the First In The Nation Primary State, so the least I can do is keep the man in clean undies.)  As I have learned, when you stop wearing clothes and start wearing "pieces," each of those garments has a set of  washing instructions completely and totally unlike all the washing instructions for all the other "pieces": Cold water, gentle cycle, tumble dry low.  Warm water, wash with like colors, hang dry.  Hand wash ONLY, NO FABRIC SOFTENER, NO BLEACH, NO STAIN REMOVER, WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING, SULLYING THIS FABRIC WITH YOUR CHEAP-ASS ON-SALE NON-ORGANIC PHOSPHATE-RIDDEN LAUNDRY SOAP??? 

Given the dire warnings on the label and the fact that I am paranoid about doing everything I can to prolong the life of these VERY EXPENSIVE garments, doing Warren's laundry is exhausting, I tell you.  So far, the only garments that's suffered was a khaki skirt of mine that I FREAKING LOVED (Banana Republic!  $2 at the thrift store!), which got blue dye on it from one of Warren's hand-dyed-by-traditional-weavers slim-fit shirts.  Meanwhile, I think his clothes are looking down on all the other clothes in the laundry basket.  Sometimes I swear they're huddling together, making fun of the hand-me-downs and thrift-store finds that make up the bulk of the laundry:  "Wow, it must be so nice to be able to wash yourself in any old load of laundry.  Of course, *I* need *very careful* washing to protect my delicate fabrics and sensitive dyes!  But you, well, any old wash setting will do.  How convenient!"   All I can say is, if they don't stop talking smack to all the other clothes, Imma gonna "accidentally" put them in a heavy-duty wash and tumble-dry them back to the Stone Age.  THAT'LL SHOW 'EM!

Letter From A Broad, To Love and To Cherish Edition

My dearest spouse, love of my life, probable father of most of my children:

Today was a long day.  A very, very long day.  How long?  Well, after a full day of working, running errands, schlepping kids, and doing chores, I then got to spend a festive evening chaperoning a middle-school dance; a task that involved choosing between standing for hours in a freezing cold cafeteria watching the kids chase one another around or standing for hours in a dark gymnasium watching the kids mill around aimlessly while music played at a decibel level that would loosen teeth.  And I got to do all this on a mostly empty stomach, since I ran out of time to eat dinner and the only "fast food" I had on hand that fits this detox diet was a box of dried apricots and a packet of almonds. 

So when I finally do get home and have half a moment to myself, that *might* not be the best choice of time to engage in a deep conversation about the political climate around your office and what you think that means for you.   Actually, I should change that to "try to engage," because yours truly did her level best to send subtle cues to you that this matter would be better off left for another time.  Well, that's if you consider statements like, "Honey, I really am not in a frame to talk about this right now," or, "I just want to read blogs and zone out for awhile, is that okay?" to be subtle; otherwise, I think I was pretty damn well crystal clear on that point.  Obviously I was wrong, since you KEPT ON TALKING TO ME, but maybe that's just me.

I know you will immediately counter this by saying, "That's okay, I just won't share anything about work with you anymore," which is not at all what I am trying to accomplish here.  I DO want you to tell me about what's on your mind, but when I tell you, "I just want to read blogs and zone out for awhile, is that okay?", that means, I do not want to talk to you about your work RIGHT THIS MOMENT.  And therefore NOTHING PRODUCTIVE will come from continuing to talk to me about your work, because right now?  At this moment?  I want to zone out in front of my computer monitor with my @#$34ing healthy cup of chamomile tea, read about what my little friends in the computer are up to, and NOT have to try to follow a complicated conversation and make an intelligent response.  So when I tell you I'm zoning out, and I'm turned around looking at something on the screen, and I'm not engaging with you, that means I'm not listening.  Capice?  Good.  Now if you will excuse me, I have some Wastebooking to do. 

Love,

Your Wife

Diamonds Are For Never

Well, Valentine's Day fast approacheth, and if past history is any indication, it is yet another opportunity for me and Warren to fail at being the Epically Romantic Couple of the Year. We are both really, really bad at gift procurement for one another, and that's not for lack of knowledge about what to get.   I have made no secret of my deep-seated longing for a big hunk of South African real estate, either here on my virtual pages or in person, and my husband has a very targeted wish list of his own, mostly for high-ticket items with internal combustion engines.  Unfortunately, we are saddled with the twin disabilities of being 1) big dreamers when it comes to gifts for ourselves; and 2) big cheapskates when it comes to buying gifts for each other.   I think I gave Warren chapstick once, now that I think about it, and Warren was sincerely happy to get it, if that gives you any insight into our gifting patterns.

Anywhat, Warren is the master at bestowing the gift-that-keeps-on-giving.  Or perhaps I should say, he is the master of bestowing "gift" status on items that weren't intended to be gifts.  Here's how it works.  Act I:

Warren (at a random, non-holiday/gift-giving time on the calendar):  What do you think about getting a new [big ticket item here]?

Me:  Can we fix the old one?

Warren:  Wellll, we've fixed it a couple of times already, so we need to think about either putting some money into refurbishing it, or we should figure out when we want to get a new one.

And then we run numbers and crunch budgets and tally expenses, and because we are terminally cheap and use everything down to the nubbin, we figure out that it is more expensive in the long run to fix the outmoded and inefficient [big ticket item] than it is to buy a new one, or if possible, a very-slightly-but-not-much used one.  Then Act II begins:

Me:  Hey, it's almost [name of event wherein gift-giving is expected]!  Want to know what you can get me?  Need a hint??

Warren:  I just got you a new [big ticket item] last month.  We spent our gift money on that.

Now, did you catch that oh-so-clever intellectual sleight of hand trick?  It's when the item that  Warren suggested replacing when Warren initiated the conversation somehow becomes my gift, thereby negating the need for further gift contemplation and procurement.  Do you know what kinds of things Warren usually suggests replacing?  Things like CARS.  Or FIREPLACE STOVE INSERTS.  Or ROOFS.  In short, things that you cannot dress up with, take on a luxury cruise, brag about to all your girlfriends, or boast about seeing on any of the Real Housewives franchises.  It's a triple whammy! 

1. He doesn't have to shop.
2. He doesn't have to think about holidays, birthdays, anniversaries, etc.
3. He gets to double-dip maintaining the house and, in his mind anyway, keeping up with his gift-giving obligations.

Once again, Warren's ability to strategize and position himself to the best tactical advantage has left me in the dust.  Unless I can somehow spin my endless ministrations to the enormous pile of laundry that never seems to diminish as an extramarital duty,  I am screwed and he is going to have a permanent upper hand in all future gift-giving exchanges.   Good thing I never get him any gifts anyway.

 

"I Do"-Overs

A divorced friend of ours recently has made comments about dipping his toe once again in the matrimonial waters, a fact which makes me very happy.  Why?  A free date night out, of course!!!  Well, 'free,' except for the exorbitant babysitting fees one has to pay in order to leave one's flesh and blood behind; the local child protective establishment has an unfortunate tendency to get shirty when one leaves the cats in charge of one's children.  (What?  In grownup years the older cat is in her late fifties at least; you'd think that would count.)

Another reason why I'm excited is the thought of the reception afterward.  She's chic, he's metrosexual and they're both foodies, so any nuptial celebration they plan will reflect that (not to mention that the bar will be both open and top-shelf). 

Pondering the kind of celebration they might collectively create got me thinking:  If I had the chance to have a second wedding ceremony, what would I do differently?  And yes, before you ask, my do-over wedding would feature the same groom.   Our wedding was lovely, don't get me wrong, but I did feel compelled to be relentlessly practical throughout the whole process to keep costs and inconvenience down.  If I had it to do over again, I'd have a small but deluxe black-tie affair, with champagne, canapes, and wedding-cake petits fours with me in something like this:

 

What???  It could happen!  With a year of daily gym visits... and some surgery...

Not to mention I'd be wearing these:

You know what the style name is?  CAROLINE, thank you very much!!!  How could I NOT wear these???  They'd be so useful later on!  I could wear them, ummmm.... oh, okay, never.  I could never wear them again.  SO WHAT.  Cute shoes are their own justification!

So, if you had to do it all over again, what would you do differently about your wedding?  Bigger?  Smaller?  None at all?  Vegas, baby?  And notice I said WEDDING and not MARRIAGE, so Britney, if you're tempted to comment "not marry Jason Alexander OR K-Fed," well ... we know that already. 

I Will Beat Him Down, I Swear. Just As Soon As I Get Off the Couch. UPDATED

"Guess what, India?" I asked my older daughter.  "You and Cici and I have Thursday off!  We can get up late, go watch cartoons in our pj's, make cookies, we'll do whatever we feel like doing!"

"Hey, you have Thursday off?" my husband said happily.  "Maybe I'll take Thursday off, too!"

I turned on my husband so rapidly, his head recoiled.  "Listen here, mister," I snarled (I think I might even have bared my teeth), "if you take Thursday off, you are NOT taking over our lazy day with a million and one chores, and activities, and plans to run around all over the place because  'oh, we should go do this,' and 'oh, we should go do that' - you got that???"

"Humph," the love of my life grouched, "I might as well just go to work."

Readers, I love my husband.  Indeed, I love the man so much, I married him.  But I am not so blinded by affection that I can't see my husband's (few, minor) faults.  And his bald spot, but that's a different post.  Anyway, as I was saying, my husband is a man of many virtues, but he lacks one or two.  Here I am referring to the ability to lollygag, to laze about, to enjoy doing nothing.  He also lacks the ability to appreciate the allure of a cute pair of shoes and ridiculously large diamonds, but that's also another post.  As I was saying before I so rudely interrupted myself again, the dude lives to get stuff done.  His idea of 'relaxing' generally involves more activity than most people do in a week, while mine involves spending entire 24-hour periods horizontal on the couch.  This is why, when the girls are in my charge on a Saturday morning, I shove a bowl of cereal or two in their general direction and then let them watch cartoons until they start punching one another.  When they're in his charge for the same duration of time, they've already gone downtown to get a muffin and checked out books at the library and gone for a walk and gotten lunch and played at the playground and walked home by the time I get dressed.  And no weekend is complete until we've picked up the house, run all our errands and checked a score of chores off the to-do list. Really, it's exhausting being married to him sometimes. 

And that, dear readers, is why I banished my husband from my day off.  Oh, sure, Warren could have agreed to keep his mitts off my languor-filled agenda, but I know him better than that - he wouldn't be able to help himself.  It's exactly analogous to the old folk tale about the scorpion who asked the frog to take him across the river.  The frog said yes, but only if the scorpion promised not to sting him and thus kill them both.  Halfway across the river, the scorpion stung the frog, and sure enough, both of them began to drown.  Before the paralysis hit his jaw muscles, the frog managed to croak out, "Why?  Why did you do that?"

"I couldn't help it, man,"  came the response.  "It's in my nature."

And that's EGGZACTLY the issue here.  I know it Warren wouldn't last two hours before he'd be tapping his feet and mentally cataloguing everything he could be doing.  I can remember many a Saturday morning in the early days of our marriage, when I used to sleep in until 9:00 a.m. or later.  (Nine a.m.!  Or later!  On a regular basis!!!)  Those were the halcyon days, my friends, and now that 7:30 on a Saturday morning counts as "sleeping in" only because I wasn't woken up by the alarm, I'm sorry I wasn't more appreciative of those lovely, lazy mornings when I had them (although for some reason, typing that last sentence brought to mind an image of George Costanza yelling, "You can stuff your sorrys in a sack, mister!!").  So I fully intend to appreciate having the opportunity to lollygag around, on a weekday no less, even if I know the girls won't let me exercise my hibernating abilities to their fullest extent.  And if Warren thinks he's going to horn in on my nice, slothful, to-do-list-free day, well, I'm sorry, but he's got another think coming.  And he can stuff those sorrys in a sack, mister!

 

 

EDITED TO ADD: We have reached a compromise. We are going to the Children's Museum in Boston with the girls. This fulfills his need to go Do Something with our bonus day, and my need not to be productive. And I'd damn well better get to be the one who sleeps in, too.

Generous To A Fault

Warren and I are, professionally speaking, both just cogs in the machine.  And we know it.  He does... whatever it is he does for a middling-sized retail entity, and I spend six hours a day preventing America's Hope for the Future from vandalizing the bathrooms and getting knocked up before they fully realize their potential.  The difference is, Warren works for the for-profit world, and I live off the fat of the land (or at least their income tax revenues).  So while we both may be too busy working for The Man to be able to stick to him, Warren gets to enjoy a few more perks than I do.  Such as getting a signing bonus that enabled him to pay off his student loans for grad school.  And going to conferences in pleasant places of the world, at the time of year during which they are most pleasant.  For the past few years, Warren has had the opportunity to go visit Las Vegas at various points of the year when it is neither hot enough to melt titanium out there nor very nice here.  (I, on the other hand, got to go to a conference just this past week.  It was held in the renovated basement of the old high school.  I got a sandwich AND a diet soda with my conference fee, and I didn't even have to pay extra for it!  That, my friends, is living it up!)

Anyhoo, whenever Warren hies off to places afar it makes for some hard slogging at this end of the rope.  Ordinarily, I have to run around like a chicken with its head cut off OR one with its head up its @ss, but during business trips the pace doubles, so that I'm running around like the chicken who had its head cut off and THEN firmly embedded in its nether regions.  So when he went out to Nevada last spring, I told him in no uncertain terms that I wanted some kind of remuneration for all my extra effort.  "I want a gift," I said in my out-loud voice,"and I want a good present, too, not just a t-shirt."

Now here I have to interrupt myself to explain that Warren, while he has many stellar qualities, is a horrible gift-giver.  Once we were clearly on the road to matrimony, he heaved an enormous sigh of relief and turned over all gift procurement and distribution responsibilities to yours truly.  Also, being the relentlessly levelheaded sort, he defines "gift" as "something you need and can use every day."  By his lights, the best possible gift in the world is a pair of wool socks.  I, on the other hand, define "gift" as, "something you desperately want and dream of having that you cannot possibly justify getting for yourself."  The best possible gift in my book is small, sparkly, and comes in carat weight.  Needless to say, what we have here is a failure to communicate.  Furthermore, my nearest and dearest kinfolk are ALL in Warren's camp.  When we affianced, he came to his first Christmas at my parents' house.  After a morning spent opening packages of winter underwear and suchlike, he told me, "I like your family.  Their gifts are so practical."  Words that make a girl's heart go pitty-pat, no?

So Warren went off to Las Vegas, and I spent four days doing double-duty parenting, along with my usual full-time job and other commitments (Woman With Kids, how do you do it?!?).  Throughout the four days, I wondered:  What kind of delightful bauble or tasteful trinket would he grace me with upon his return?  When he walked in the door after dinner that night, we all greeted him with cries of gladness, followed by my cry of, "Whadja bring me, dear?"  With a huge smile, he whipped out a small plastic bag with three parcels wrapped in tissue paper in it, one parcel for each of us.  We unwrapped them to find:

Yep.  This is what my husband got me for "jewelry".  Or actually, this is what he got for the girls AND me; I just decided to swipe the girls' friendship bracelets for the day and wear them with my LOVELY real-faux-semi-precious-rocklike-bead bracelet.  My husband bought me a present at the CHECKOUT COUNTER OF THE AIRPORT CONVENIENCE STORE, PEOPLE.  And his argument defending that incidence of poor decision-making?  "I was busy.  I didn't know what you'd like, and I didn't have time to go shopping."

Now, those of you with oft-traveling spouses can correct me if I'm wrong (except that I'm NOT wrong), but I believe that small remembrances for one's spouse after a significant absence are immune from the "don't look a gift horse in the mouth" rule.  Why?  Because a present given to the person who has just shouldered his or her own share of the household management AND yours as well isn't a gift, it's a consolation prize.  It's the absentee partner's way of acknowledging that yes, I just got a free pass to spend x number of days away from home, along with the clean towels and fresh bed linens and adult conversation at dinnertime that such a trip includes, and yes, I realize that I got to go have grown-up time with grown-up people and without dishes, temper tantrums and endless recitations of Clifford the Big Red Dog Meets the IRS Auditors and I am really really sorry you couldn't go too, but look!  I got you this really really nice luxury item that you will love and adore and cherish every time you look at it.  THAT'S what a business trip gift is about.

"What?" Warren said, miffed, after my reaction registered as being less than ebullient. "You said you wanted jewelry."  Yeah.  And beaded friendship bracelets are to jewelry as Kim Kardashian is to Sophia Loren.  But that's okay.  I am nothing if not resilient and resourceful.  Next time he goes out of town on business, I'll just buy myself my own damn hi-honey-I'm-home gift, and it's going to be a doozy.  I bet he'll damn well make time to get me a gift on his own behalf after that!

Mom Always Liked You Best

Over the Independence Day holiday, we decamped from the First In The Nation Primary State and headed for the State Formerly Known As Home, as is our annual custom.  The Town With A Famous Private School has a perfectly lovely 4th of July celebration, I'm sure, but my small hometown, a tourist mecca my friend Sue and I fondly refer to as "Funkytown", offers the trifecta of a bang-up parade, a big fireworks celebration AND a town beach mere steps away from the house.  Funkytown-ward we were bound, and as the saying goes, a good time was had by all. 

As is my wont, I managed to leave a few items behind, items that aren't necessary for daily functioning, but that you don't want to have to replace in a fast hurry, either. So I called home to make sure I hadn't done something epically stupid, like the time the arm of the futon couch frame bounced out of the back of the truck while I was on the highway and I didn't even notice.  (Yeah, I still have no idea how I managed that one.)  "They're right here," my mom said, after I told her where the missing items might be located.  "Well, Warren and the girls will be up for the weekend in a few weeks, so he'll pick them up then," I said.

"Warren?" my mom queried.  "Yeah, that's the weekend I'm going away with my friend, so he's bringing the girls up, remember?"

"Hmm," my mother mused.  "We'll have to do something special."

Okay, did any of you catch that???  Warren's coming up without me, so my mom wants to do 'something special' for him???  This is proof - COLD, HARD PROOF - that Warren is now my parents' favorite child!  I can understand why Warren might have golden-boy status in their eyes.  He did take one of their financially feckless and eternally single daughters off their hands, after all, promising to love and cherish and share a near-perfect credit rating with her til death do us part.  Then there's the small matter of providing my mother with two lovely granddaughters to dote over and stuff with junk food, when poor Mom had thought that train had left the station. I know my father appreciates having a fellow Y-chromosome bearer around with whom he can share a lifetime of accrued wisdom, such as which cheaper brands of liquors taste best (Old Overholt and Lukso- Lucksa- some kind of Polish potato vodka).  But planning something special?  Specifically because he's going to be there without ME?  That makes him their favorite - and he's not even their own flesh and blood!  I ask you! 

Is it possible to have feelings of sibling rivalry - with your spouse???