How do you fold a thong? I’ve tried just about everything and decided there’s no way to properly place this triangular piece of fabric in a drawer. So now, I simply throw them in the corner next to her panties. (I’ve learned women don’t wear underwear they wear panties and undergarments) Discovering how to do laundry “correctly” has been somewhat challenging. I understand the whole darks and lights thing but any more than that was simply not needed and a waste of my time. Thus began my foray into “Laundry, the one job that’s NEVER done.” When you think you’re done someone else has just changed clothes, wiped down the dirty dog, spilled juice or wine on themselves or simply decided they needed a new outfit. I’m almost ready to begin wearing disposable diapers around the house to cut down on the loads but I don’t want to rush the inevitable.
My basic guide for laundry has always been supply and demand. When you’re running low replenish. It’s what we do with groceries or gas, we buy enough to get through a week, hopefully, and then go get some more. It should be the same with laundry. When you’re running low on panties, thongs, boxers or jeans it’s time to put in a load and replenish. Sounds simple but nothing in a marriage is simple, except sex. It’s simple and clean and I’d prefer to do it more often than I do laundry. Again, the whole do it when you need it comes to mind. It’s just how I’m wired, it’s how most men are wired. Women are wired to do laundry. Even if she knows I’ve done a few loads, if there’s any left, which is usually the case since I’m waiting for a full load, she will do it. It drives me crazy! Why is she doing the laundry when she knows I’m doing the laundry? What message is she sending? It’s insulting, insinuating that I’m not able to do it, that I need her help. I don’t need her help, I’m trying to help her!
Doing the laundry has become a daily test of household knowledge. I think sometimes she wears things just to see if I can figure out where they go. It’s a good thing she works during the day so I have time to wander the house, aimlessly looking through drawers and seldom used closets to find the perfect place for this odd item of clothing. Only to hear, months later, “Dean where did you put that pink blouse with the three quarter snap front and drop shoulder? It’s always been right here with all my other drop shoulder tops?” Drop shoulder what? Who organizes clothes by their style or cut? Not only do I not know what she’s talking about? I have no idea where in this house it could be? Why didn’t I just ask her where to put it when I washed it? Because we don’t think that way. I don’t need to be told where something goes in my own house any more than I need to stop and ask for directions from a stranger. As Men we know where we’re going and where things should go. We don’t need to be told, in fact we hate to be told which is why we don’t ask. Sort of a different twist on the whole; “Don’t ask Don’t tell” thing. Except, this is Don’t ask Don’t Be Told. So here I am, stuck at a crossroad uncertain of my immediate future. Should I admit I have no Idea and yes she is better at doing the laundry and she knows this house better than me? Or, take a quick guess as to where I think it should be and prove I truly am a master of my own domain. It’s at this moment that she spots it, hanging just under the drop shoulder tops which are neatly folded on the upper shelf. “Oh Deano I never hang these it’s easier to just fold them.” She was right, it was a pain to try to hang that top with the huge gaping neck hole on a hanger but I was determined to do it and do it right. If only I had asked where it should be placed I could have saved myself both time and effort. She would have felt better knowing I needed her input regarding our home.
Learning how to do someone’s job that’ they’ve been doing since they were a teenager is not an easy task, made more difficult if you choose not to ask for advice. Letting someone do your job is also difficult and leaves you feeling, somehow, less fulfilled. So how do we maneuver through these changing rolls when a Husband runs the house? How do I take over some of her daily jobs without taking away from all she is as a Wife and Mother? I need to be more willing to ask for her advice, there’s no shame in that. She has to allow me to make a few changes to the way things use to be. There can always be another way or idea. It’s sort of like teamwork without a captain.
What I realize is this: no one can do it all but working women continue to try. It wears them down and makes them feel less of a woman to have someone else do “what every Mother should do.” In a time of great recession when more men are staying home while their Wives go to work it’s OK to let go of some of the daily grind. Remember, it’s our lives, no one else’s and if we don’t fit into their mold of what rolls men and women should have at home it doesn’t matter. It’s just a different way of doing things, like the laundry. Should it be folded or hung? There’s no right or wrong way to do it there’s only our way and that’s the way it should be.
Now as for that thong: “Honey, how do you fold these things?”...”Dean you don’t fold thongs! You’re making this much too difficult. Just throw them in the corner of the drawer.” “Right, I should have known that.”
