Mythical Creature: The Other Wife

Parenthood. The joys are limitless, but the strains can be as well. The first time we held our daughter we fell in love again... little did we know that the first sound of her crying was the starter gun on our competition for who does the most for our family...

"This isn't quite the way you said it would be." Huh? We're happy. Have 2 beautiful girls. What was it supposed to be like? "I thought I would have less to do around the house." Oh. You are referring to our decision for me to stay home. What chores do you exactly do that overwhelms you? The garbage. Yard work. Car maintenance, I mean, you are an automotive technician. "Well, I know you do a lot." Damn straight I do. 24 hrs a day. "I told a guy at work the other day that I needed to get home to do chores and he poked fun at me cause he doesn't have to do that stuff. His wife takes out the garbage, does the yard work... she thinks he does enough just working, that he should just come home and rest." Silence.

This was mild compared to what I have heard other husbands say of their stay at home wives. I understand that from his perspective he imagines the freedom of Sunday afternoons with his feet up and cartoons on TV. He leaves me in the morning on the computer trying to pry my eyes open to read my work e-mails with a cup of coffee and as soon as he returns, so do I, to the position in front of the computer in an effort to gain back my sanity. Does he imagine the middle filled with much of the same? His thoughts exaggerated by his love and longing for his little girls. Maybe he thinks that I do not understand the sacrifices he makes... funny, don't you think? Let me remind him of the many mythical creatures that help him along the way...

Where does all the hair go that falls off all of our pets? (2 Golden Retrievers and 2 cats) or the wrappers and stuff that you and the kids scatter around through the house? How do the toys always seem to end up back in the spot they began? Perhaps an elf. I imagine him high strung with red hair and a beard cursing at his once clean path to a never appearing pot o' gold. Is that a fairy I saw with the toilet wand who made it so sparkling clean? The spots that you leave every morning on the mirror disappear into thin air by the time you return in the evening perhaps she lent a hand there too. I can only imagine an ogre would be picking up all your dirty clothes & boxer shorts lugging them down to the basement below. However, once fresh and clean, an ogre wouldn't do, maybe its another fairy who returns them to our room. Who does the dishes? Changes the diapers? Dusts the walls? Oh my, maybe we'll never know. Better yet, "the other wife" might live here, a creature who is most rare. She can do it all in a single day while singing a song and dancing the jig telling her husband how she wouldn't exist if he wasn't so big and brave. Oh wait, cannot be for the lawn would also be trim.

My husband makes me happy. He is a good Dad and works very hard for us girls. I would never let him think less, but I slowly leaned over and whispered in his ear, "The grass is always greener in fantasy land. Does your friend live next to the jolly green giant?"