Writing has long been a therapeutic exercise for me. It is only through using the written word that I am able to express myself clearly, reflect objectively on situations, and see the humor in what I am going through. Never has this been more true since getting married.
First of all, I am really lucky that my husband lets me recount these situations so publicly. He has a really good sense of humor about it, and I find complete solace in the fact that I am not the only one out there struggling to cohabitate with another human being. I'm so glad my friends enjoy my tales and are able to laugh with me, at the very least, or relate to this time-honored tradition politicians today describe as "sacred." There are days when "barbaric" seems to be a more apt term. Today is, as you may have guessed, one of those days.
Let me start this anecdote by saying I realize that I probably have OCD. I have a hard time compromising and it is, indeed, my way or the highway. There but for the grace of any and all deities, he has not yet chosen the highway. He's an amazing guy who, despite probably having a touch of ADHD, is quite laid back. My marriage works in weird ways. I'm used to being by myself, and he is busy completing a PhD, which sometimes keeps him at lab until late hours. I don't get in his way, he doesn't get in mine...usually.
Most women would give anything for their husbands to throw in a load of laundry...but as you know, I am not your average girl. I have a very structured system of doing laundry that I liken to hatching baby birds. If one falls out of the nest and is touched by human hands, it's all over for the baby bird. Similarly, if someone tries to help me by transferring clothing from the washer to the dryer, my system is ruined. Follow me? I'm sure you don't, because you don't understand my system. I absolutely have to know what is clean, what is dirty, where the item last was, and what cannot go in the washer or dryer. Judging from the amount of shrunken sweaters my husband had in college, he is not a great judge of "low heat only" items.
Most men would give anything to hear that their wives don't want help with a household task. As you know, I didn't marry an average dude. I married a man that so wishes to help me around the house, my requests for not touching the laundry often go unheard. Shirts are hung on hangers backwards and unbuttoned, not to mention unironed, socks are never matched correctly and pockets are never emptied before they hit the washer.
Today we returned home from a 2 day camping trip (my peace offering to him for agreeing to marry me) to discover that our washer wouldn't turn on. I shrugged, moved our campfire-smelling bedding out of the way and told him we needed to contact the landlord. Mysteriously, our dryer still turned on, but we (thanks to my rigid system) have enough clothing to last us until then. Also, our bed still has bedding on it from before our trip, so we were all set.
Somewhere between here and Pennsylvania Dutch, my husband gets the bright idea to wash our bedding in the tub and dry it in the dryer. I protest, but as per usual, my protests of "don't touch the laundry" go unheard. Before I knew it, the sheets were being washed in our bathtub. Luckily, I spared my handmade quilts the same washboard misery as our thread-bare sheets. (They so need replacing, but I'm waiting for a king bed.)
My husband is amazing. He does a TON around the house without me having to ask, especially where my nemesis, the dishes, are concerned. He goes above and beyond "team effort," so when he helps, I try my best to grit my teeth and not nitpick at how the job gets done. I simply went out to get some takeout for dinner and looked forward to the thought of sleeping on clean, warm sheets after 2 days of sleeping on the ground.
"I don't think the dryer's working..." he says to me. The dryer turns on and spins, but no warm air comes out. Two sets of sheets and a fleece blanket are currently dripping water all over my bathroom floor. A wet mattress pad is lying in the washer for storage. Another set of sheets and presumably every last pillow case are turning around in the heatless dryer as I type...my comfy, comfy queen bed that my aching shoulder and back were so looking forward to after two nights on the sloping, rocky ground....stripped of all bedding. It's too bad I cannot harness the flames of anger shooting from my eyes to dry our sheets...
And for the life of me, I cannot figure out what is worse: not knowing where I will sleep tonight with this chiropractic mess, or the sheets dripping water all over the bathroom floor, rug, and into the pail he strategically placed to catch only SOME of the water.
Husband, I love you very much. I so appreciate all you do for me whether or not I ask. You're an amazing person. But I feel that after having spent 5 years at Stanford University in a graduate level chemistry program, the following should not be that difficult for you to comprehend:
For the purposes of this experiment, I liken the laundry to chemistry. Tonight's laundry debacle is the equivalent of me coming to your lab and tipping over all of your beakers, dumping out all of your samples, cracking the glass of your glove box, and changing your unfinished thesis to a pink font and emailing it to your advising committee.
I don't touch your lab. Please don't do the laundry.
