I am willing to sacrifice my living room in the winter and the lawn (where he hangs the laundry outside) in the summer so that I don’t have to camp again. Who wants to be all dirty, smell like smoke, chase skunks or bears from your eating area and even worse things if you don’t camp where there is a bathroom nearby? Not me. Give me a kitchen, a bathroom and Words with Friends and I am a happy camper.

I used to want my home to look all neat and pretty but then I had kids and it ruined me. Gone was the need for perfection. With each broken treasured vase, lost article of favorite clothing and scratched up/marked up wall, a little piece of Martha-like desire for perfection died. RIP.

I am all in for that “lived in” look and feel as long as it is clean, of course.

The problem of the environment is the extension of good housekeeping of the thinking woman.
 ~ Marjory Stoneman Douglas

I guess  I will miss the dining hall meal, waiting in line, sneaking into guy’s bathrooms in the guy’s dorm to go, hearing the “F” word in what seems to be about every other word, and  smelling dirty laundry from 4 weeks ago. Oh, the things I will do for my friends.

On a positive note, my son is calling me more often. Of course it’s to tell me what items to bring up for Parents Weekend that he needs now that I told him to pack 4 weeks ago but he blew me off about.

Not being able to be there and observe for myself, I will have to depend on my husband’s reporting abilities to see how my son is doing this year. I am making him a list of all the things to ask/check out because he is a man and won’t notice and he knows better than to blow me off. That’s what 30 years of marriage can do for you.

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“The family – that dear octopus from whose tentacles we never quite escape, nor, in our inmost hearts, ever quite wish to.”   ~ Dodie Smith

Sidebar – Some of you may not know that some (and I mean most) men aren’t always as perceptive about their clothing. “Some” of them might even have that cavalier “devil may care” attitude about their plaid shorts from 1973 or their hockey jersey from 8th grade that they plan to wear to your high school reunion kickoff picnic.

It’s similar to dressing a child. A wife might contemplate setting her husband’s clothing out for him the evening so as to fend off any bickering about the fact that brown shirts don’t go with black pants or that striped pants and plaid shirts clash in the early morning hours. On the other hand, it makes for a good laugh when your kids get a load of what their wearing and then chastise you for their outfit, like you aren’t providing adequate supervision.

But I digress. The real kicker about his winter coat came a couple of days later when he announced that he was going shopping for a new winter coat for next year – at the second hand store.

I was thinking about jumping in the dumpster and rooting around to retrieve his donation but decided he’ll never get around to buying his own coat anyway.

As I thought more about it, I decided he is a clever man. He just guaranteed himself a new coat that I will be buying. I hate to be outsmarted by a guy who can’t even match colors.

—–

“The finest clothing made is a person’s skin, but, of course, society demands something more than this.” ~Mark Twain

My husband made lasagne, which takes him the whole day. He does the same dinner for us every year. It was delicious. I was happy too that my daughter observed how funny it was that it takes him the whole day do make a dinner, something I do daily in about 30 minutes for less. Now, THAT observation is a birthday present.

I used to hang around and put my two cents in (he didn’t put any sauce on the top layer – none!) but that was a mistake. I noticed this after about 25 years. I decided to just shut my mouth and let him make dinner. If he made a mistake, it was his. So I don’t get tempted to intercede, I leave to get a mani-pedi combo.

My birthday gift to you other wives out there who might be like I was in my younger years is some advice. Offering unwanted supervision when your beloved is trying to take a load off, even though it is hard for him to do and easy for you, isn’t a good idea. A few mistakes make for a more relaxing dinner atmosphere. And heaven knows, he’s had to eat a few of mine from time to time. Chow.

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“Mistakes are part of the dues one pays for a full life.”  ~ Sophia Loren

Sidebar – In the days before his chlosterol went sky high, I used to bake him pies with these wild berries and in fact, my pies were so much in demand that an elderly neighbor man would hang bags of fruit on my door for me to make him one. He would always have enough fruit for two pies: one for my family and one for him. It was all very warm and cozy until I dropped off a pie and got my head bitten off by his girlfriend for making him pies. Apparently he forgot to mention he was diabetic and was getting me to provide him his sugar fix on the sly, which didn’t go over well with the new lady friend. He recently passed away and I was too afraid to ask the girlfriend if it was from old age or complications from his diabetes, but, back to the husband shucking elderberries around my dining room table.

When he is just about done, my mate of 29, count ‘em 29 years, says to me, “Hey Hon. Do you know how to make pies?”

My reply was not very sweet, very crusty, and like the large container of elderberries in his lap, was a bit pithy.

But how could I blame him? He has been on the planet Oblivion for the past 29 years. I’ve booked the next flight to Scruyewulon.

In the event my daughters decide to marry someday, I have tried my best to gently bring my kids to the realization that men are not the swiftest or most observant creatures in the world, but none the less, can be company on a cold night and are fun to do certain things with, and  they come in handy when you have a lot of groceries in the car or with leftovers. I hope that I have succeded because my mother never told me and I have had to learn the hard way. It was is no picnic, and he is lucky that there wasn’t a pie tin in the near vicinity or he’d have a new hat.

On the positive side of this masculine lack of the power to see, to remember, to open the mouth without thinking, is the fact that he hasn’t seemed to notice the 20 pounds I put on this year. I think he thinks I haven’t noticed his 20, so I guess we are even.

Today I am baking the two pies from his berry collection: one for the family and one for his face.

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“I am a marvelous housekeeper. Every time I leave a man I keep his house.”  ~  Zsa Zsa Gabor

(Dear Zsa Zsa. There has to be a better way.)

29 years. And I wasn’t really that young, but we joke about it because apparently I look somewhat younger than my husband. In reality, we are only three years apart.

I developed an affinity for one of my husband’s co-workers soon after I met her. On our second get together, after a few minutes, she leaned in and said, “Now that we know each other, you must share the story behind the age difference between you two.” Totally serious. Ah, yes. This story, and getting proofed when I was 34, have become a couple of my favorites. So is the story of the corn kernel on my hubby’s cheek, but that is fodder for another post. You know you are getting old when your favorite stories are about your successful (and vain desperate) attempts to look younger than you are, and the times that others look silly.

To celebrate our anniversary day, we spent three hours in hot humid temperatues pulling weeds at the community garden and then went for a cup of coffee. None of the other people showed up – just us. Mucking round in weeds wasn’t good for my pedicure, I can assure you that. Later, we dropped our son off at a graduation party and had dinner at our favorite fancy French restaurant, which was delicious. At dinner, my husband asked what exotic beers that might have. The waiter suggested a Belgian beer that he said was dark and fruity. I said, “Sounds just like your brother. You might like it.” That waiter heard me and didn’t even bat an eyelash. We snickered as the (authentic) young couple across the way looked at us like the two fools we are.

Returning home, we (make that I) watched “Philadelphia Story” that I had Netflixed a month ago so I could get it off my hutch where it collected dust kittens, but the mate fell asound asleep. At midnight I woke him to go and pick the child up from the party. I don’t think anyone else could come close to the romatic nature that we obviously share with each other. Obviously this passion is the secret to our successful 29 years of marriage. Or perhaps it is my sarcasm.

At any rate, my mother was wrong.

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“Love at first sight is easy to understand; it’s when two people have been looking at each other for a lifetime that it becomes a miracle.“  ~ Amy Bloom