This was a weird little treat: LINK
How strange that a man wrote a piece for the WSJ explaining that my problem is not a Woman Problem. Or a Problem Of Me Not Being Awesome Enough (because really, how would that even be possible?). Or a Problem Of Me Not Thinking Ahead (because, seriously, I know that's not possible).
Yesterday my husband woke up feeling exceptionally tired and irritable after several days of irritability. I was beginning to lose patience with his irritability, if you must know. I require a lot of witty repartee. Or, failing that, a lot of soul-searching conversation. Or failing that, a lot of optimistic entertainment. Even the least irritable man in the world would find me exhausting, after a while. Mr. OBL is not the least irritable man in the world under the best of circumstances.
After he bit my head off and I turned around and eviscerated him in return, he suggested we go get coffee together before starting our respective days.
At the Starbucks, he talked about how tired he was and how he felt overwhelmed by his job and a little bit like he might be at the end of his rope.
I was so excited he opened this door for me, because I'm great at soul-searching conversation about how the system, man, the culture, these roles, the way the world expects us to behave.......how it's all just bleeding us dry, and we should consider going on a two-year RV homeschool adventure through the National Parks (damn you, sequester and budget cuts!!).
Let me tell you, I was really in a groove, I was hitting all the key points, patriarchy is destroying both of us, babe, it's not fair to you either, it's killing me, living this life, but it's killing you too, this is THE MAN we're talking about here, we have no life balance, we have no family balance, we're out of whack, man, do you feel me? Are you picking up what I'm putting down? We could drop marriage therapy and stop taking all these pills, man, it's about LIFESTYLE, it's about killing yourself because it's what they WANT, It's like when I stopped eating gluten and it started a whole revolution in the food industry...............
And he said he was going to take the day off and maybe go back to bed and I thought I'd unlocked the key to a new way of ordering our lives.
But then it turned out he had a virus and a fever and he just needed to sleep it off for a day.
So, yeah.
But on the bright side, I have two full days of writing in front of me and I'm cranked up on some serious caffeine. So The Man will just have to suck it for a couple of days and try to kill me again beginning on Monday.
ALSO: fuck you, sequester, I don't need your stinking park rangers to wander the Mariposa Grove. LINK.