Helping at Home

Whenever married women get together there is inevitably a conversation about household chores. I've talked about Domestic Sexy in past posts and highlighted a few amazing days with due credit given. At some point one of the women in my clique will say something that is the equivalent to "it isn't worth the effort." I always state that after 14 years of marriage, the partnership should indeed, be a partnership. It might not be done like you would like it done, but get over it. I say this often. I'm going to stop.

See, we haven't had matching socks in months. It started one season when I went on strike and I didn't care what happened. I literally only searched for my clean clothes and I have plenty of hosiery options that I can rely on most days. One of the kids asked about socks early in the school year and I promptly directed them to their own drawer. They replied, "we don't have socks." I know there are socks and plenty of them. And then....I started the investigation.

For my entire strike the socks were conveniently placed in unmatched batches at the bottom of a variety of baskets, with no regard to size, owner or style. Within a few weeks the socks had no mates and the mess was expanding. On one particular morning, the sock hunt led to the photo above, where well meaning children were trying to identify the things that belonged to them. I have now made up in my mind, there is no equity in helping at home. Three months later and the socks have still never been the same. They went away for a few days in August and their grandmother simply purchased new socks. She will be saddened to know that they too have gone into the group wash, non sort, non match, non put away experience. This is so not domestic sexy. This is so why married women suggest that their spouse need not help at home.

I think its a plot of intentional proportions when a degreed male can not accomplish laundry success. I'm the one with about 10 dozen miss matched socks all over my house, too. This would be a non-issue, but its Winter. Funds are low. The work load is high. And the socks are all over because I was convinced that my hiatus would mandate more help. Not so much.