How to Manage a Marriage

How to Manage a Marriage

I was once a typical 1950s housewife in the style of June Cleaver but those days are long gone. My journey from dresses and dishes to power suits and power plays is an interesting one that you may want to consider.

Fresh off my 42nd birthday I was considering my options as the last of our two girls left the nest to begin her adult life. I had a moldy and unfinished university education in financial administration that was pestering me to complete as well as some long smoldering ambitions. I had utilized some of my available hours during our youngest daughter's high school years to get a part time job at a local bank branch and discovered that I still had a passion for things of a financial nature. This led to a correspondence degree and an entry level job with an investment firm that needed to fill its gender equity quota. Luckily for them them, I was a spectacularly great hire and I quickly rose from assistant clerk in charge of the coffee pot to a fully licensed investment broker rapidly progressing to management in a swift five years. Turns out I was a latent prodigy.

However, on the home front nothing really changed. I still was the manager in chief in charge of cooking, cleaning and every other household duty. My husband, Peter, looked after the lawn and outside stuff as well as the traditional "manly" tasks of looking after our vehicles and basically freeloading on the rest of life's daily chores.

We were to celebrate our twenty fifth wedding anniversary in a few weeks with a party followed by a second honeymoon and I don't think either of us were looking forward to it. Peter, would have rather used his vacation time for a fishing trip with his buddies and I was too wrapped up in a project at work to take some worry free time off. Still, we seemed to be locked into that typical married life rut with no easy way out. Enter Karen.

Karen was hired as my secretary and one of the perks that came along with my promotion to management. She and I hit it off both professionally and personally. We even shared our lunch hours on those occasions when we had an hour for a leisurely lunch. Karen was quite aware of my ever increasing stress level and frequently tried to engage me in conversation about ways to bring them down from potential heart attack levels. While I appreciated her suggestions and advice, none seemed to fit my situation and frankly, I did not have much of a clue as to where my stress was coming from. I loved my job and my work environment and could not see anything that needed to change.

One day while we were sipping some wine and waiting for our waiter to bring out our lunch, Karen's phone chirped. It was her husband calling to ask when she might be home and rather he should plan for a regular dinner or just something that he could hold if she was unsure about the time. When she ended the call, I commented that it must be nice to have someone fix dinner for her. "Oh," she replied, "Jim always has a great dinner ready no matter what time I get home. It is one of his many useful talents."

I mentioned that my Peter would be hard pressed to know the recipe for a TV dinner let alone cook a meal. Karen seemed taken aback. "Are you telling me that you still cook after putting in the kind of day that you work?"

I replied that yes, I still cooked, did the laundry and kept the house clean much like I have done since the day Peter and I were married.

"No wonder you are so stressed." Karen replied. "I had you pictured as the perfect model of a modern, professional career woman and not a mommy to a man child. If you don't mind me making an observation, I think I can see where your stress is coming from and it is not your career. Do me and yourself a favor and call your husband, tell him you have to work late and that he is on his own for dinner. Just tell him that and nothing more. Don't give him a chance to ask questions; just end the conversation and block him if he tries to call you back. Then, after work, I want you to come for dinner at my house. It will give you something to think about."

I was uncomfortable about doing this but Karen was quite insistent and after a bit of back and forth with some steady persuasion from her, I agreed and made the call. Peter was not happy and started to complain but taking Karen's advice, I ended the call and immediately blocked his attempts to call me back.

I arrived at Karen's house just as her garage door was closing. Seeing me pulling in to the curb, she waited for me to join her before approaching the front door. Without a word, she opened the door and I was able to see her husband Jim just inside with two glasses of red wine one that was handed to me and one that he gave Karen along with a peck on her cheek.

"Dinner can be on the table as soon as you like," he said to Karen, "just let me know when you are ready."

Karen told him that we wanted to freshen up a bit first and maybe relax for a few minutes. She then suggested that he take our glasses into the living room and put on some soft background music. After taking care of some biological necessities, I joined her in living room finding my wine glass sitting on an end table next to a comfortable looking chair. Busy sounds and delicious smells drifted in from the kitchen as we talked.

"So," I asked Karen, "is this wine and dine behavior an everyday thing or just a demonstration for my benefit?"

"I can see how you might think it was a special performance but I can assure you that cooking and a lot of other things are part of Jim's daily routine. Laundry, housekeeping and nearly everything else around here are in his job description. You might even call him a househusband but since we don't have any kids just yet, he still works a forty hour week, just not as a demanding and irregular week as I work."

"Doesn't he want to do the usual guy stuff, you know, sports and hanging with his buds?"

"Not really. Of course he still has his own interests. He jogs and he likes to do some woodworking but his focus seems to be mainly on me."

I wondered if Jim had always been this way and as if Karen were reading my thoughts, she spoke before I could ask.

"Before Jim and I even dated too many times I let him know what I expected in a man. At first he was a bit put off but as we continued to date and our relationship developed, I could feel that my way of thinking was making some inroads. Of course, it didn't hurt that I always took the lead role when we had sex and I made sure that my needs were well satisfied before he had his turn. No blow jobs for Jimmy but plenty of foreplay and cunnilingus for me. If anything, keeping him horny and focused on my needs made him a better boyfriend and contributed to him being the near perfect husband that is currently putting the finishing touches on our dinner."

God, I thought, if only my Peter could be more like Jim. Just a little bit or even just doing the dishes would be a relief. Again, Karen was reading my mind.

"You know, Amanda that the real problem is you."

I was startled by this but all I could get out was a weak, "How so?"

"You enable your husband by acting like a stay at home housewife instead of a successful and powerful career woman. Peter is just doing what you encourage him to do and you reinforce that behavior every day with every meal you fix and every dish you dry. If you want change, you and no one else can make it happen."

I sighed. "You make it sound as if all I have to do is ask and Peter will jump to comply. You don't know him. If I pushed him like you seem to think I can, my next stop would be divorce court."

"Maybe it would be but is that so bad? You are miserable in your home life and vibrant at work. However, the stress of being both a 24/7 homemaker and a successful business woman are going to either kill you or destroy the one thing that seems to give you true happiness. I say take the plunge, lay down the law and make your hubby man up or man out. It also would not hurt to use those womanly charms that you were born with and which any heterosexual man finds difficult to resist."

"Ha!" I snorted, "womanly charms? Maybe you haven't noticed that I am north of forty and that my girlish figure has rounded out quite a bit."

"Have you looked at me Amanda? I'm five foot four and weigh around one hundred and seventy pounds. Jim is five-eight and weighs around one hundred and fifty five marvelous, taught pounds and would drop to his knees in front of me in a second if I gave him the slightest encouragement."

To prove her point she yelled, "Jim, come here will you."

Jim appeared a few seconds later wiping his hands on his apron.

"Jim, my feet are really sore. Would you mind getting the foot cream from the cabinet and giving them a rub?"

Jim left and was back in a short minute with the cream and proceeded to sit on the floor as Karen kicked off a shoe and slipped her leg over his shoulder. Jim immediately began a slow and deliberate massage of her bare foot stopping only to switch to the other foot when that leg joined its partner over his other shoulder. Karen just relaxed and let this continue in silence for around ten minutes before lifting her legs and telling Jim that he could go ahead and get dinner on the table.

As he left the room she turned to me and asked, "Any more questions? If you have any, feel free to ask Jim over dinner. He's not shy and is confident enough in his manhood that anything you ask will not intimidate him."

I thought about this and a lot of other things as Jim brought platters of steaming goodness to the table and refilled our wine glasses before joining us. The conversation must have been too bland for Karen because after about ten minutes of polite and meaningless small talk she turned and said to Jim:

"Jim, Amanda is my boss and works at least twice as hard as I do and still manages to do all the cooking, cleaning and laundry for her husband. What do you think would happen if you asked me to do those things for you?"

"I think I would be single again and very unhappy about it."

"Why is that Jim?" She asked.

"Well, first of all it would be very unfair. I mean your job is a lot tougher than mine and asking you to do all of that stuff would not be right."

"What if I offered to do half the work, how would that make you feel?"

"It would make me feel that I was not doing a very good job. I like doing the housework and even more, I like seeing you come home and just be able to relax. I know your days can be hectic and I love making this home your sanctuary. Having you pitch in all the time would take some of that away."

"How about just a little while ago when I asked you to rub my feet in from of a stranger. Did that make you feel less masculine?"

"You know that's not so Karen. I love rubbing your feet and I don't care who knows it."

"How about the other stuff we do Jimmy? Do you mind if I talk to Amanda about what goes on in our bedroom?"

Jim blushed at this but keeping a straight face he responded, "If you think she needs to hear about it, I trust your judgment. I mean it is kind of personal but I like what we do and if you need to talk to someone I don't really mind so long as we keep on doing it."

"One more thing Jim." Karen continued. "Think back to when we were dating and those first times we were intimate. At first you wanted it to be all about you but I would not go for it. Do you think that learning to put my needs first helped you to become the really great husband and fantastic lover that you are to me now?"

Jim did not miss a beat. "Absolutely!"

Karen turned to me and asked, "Well Amanda, have I given you something to think about?"

While at that exact moment I was not convinced, by the time I pulled into my driveway I had to admit that I was given plenty to think about and even more to do. Over the next two weeks Karen and I talked a few more times and I began to develop a plan.