It's OK, You Can Be Jealous
The best gift I ever got my husband was when we were living in our first apartment. While he was at work I had a cleaning lady come over and clean the apartment from top to bottom. When he walked in the door and smelled the lemony cleanliness he literally leapt with joy. He ran all over yealling, "Maria was here? You had Maria here?" Even then, he knew that I was not capable of getting the apartment even close to clean.
Fast forward 15 years and I am in the small appliance store getting new vacuum bags. A random man turns to me and says: which one do you have? To which I answer, I don't know, I never use it, my husband bought it." The man behind the counter looks at me and says, "Your husband bought it? You have a one in a million!"
And don't I know it.
But to be honest, it's a bit annoying. We used to fight about cleaning all the time until we brought a third person into the relationship -- our wonderful nanny. But even with a nanny who keeps the house very tidy, its not clean enough for him. He really doesn't like the detrious items of familiy living. And I really don't like cleaning up said items. So yes, there is some friction when he is sweeping the floor at 11:00 o'clock at night and I think that I deserve a medal just for emptying the dishwasher.
I know a lot of you are envious of me, and think I am complaining (which I am, kind of). And I don't really have a good excuse. The truth is that it is hard to meet in the middle. We see the world in different ways. He is details-oriented and has a firm belief that he can control chaos. I am more of a whole-picture person who doesn't mind living amongst a bit of craziness becaue I don't really think that I can change it (it might be that ADD thing) . There are also control issues: no matter how neat it is, it's never good enough for him and a bit of passive-aggressive laziness on my side (though, I think he would say more than a bit especially the lazy part). Maybe I'm thinking too deeply about this and it's just that he is neat and I am messy. Truth is, in most ways we balance each other out and I get the bonus of having a very neat house.
But what I do know: is that a cleaning lady is way cheaper than couple's therapy.
