Social Secretary

I did not meekly role over and accept a traditional gender role.

***

For years I was the one who paid all the bills, just like my mom does.

I have 3 semesters of college Calculus, some of which I took in high school, deciding only when faced with Diff Eq that I didn't want to be a math major after all.

But paying the bills was hell for me. I put it off to once a month, always at the last possible moment before the phones or power or whatever might be shut off, before pulling out the calculator and starting to work. It took me a swearing and sweating 4 hours to get all the bills paid, including calls to the bank to transfer funds or calculate late fees. It was hard hard hard for me.

Paul, on the other hand, went several years without going to the doctor or dentist because he couldn't bring himself to make the appointments. He chose a roommate based solely on the fact that the guy had lots of friends who were always coming over so that Paul didn't have to do any work in order to have people around frequently - who cares that they weren't necessarily his friends?

Eventually, of course, we decided to merge and purge responsibilities. I took over the social calendar and Paul took over the bills.

Over time, we've relaxed things a bit. It's just not practical for me to schedule Paul's medical appointments because I don't know the schedule of his incessant meetings at work. And as bad as I am about revolving debt, he's even worse. He can blink and there's suddenly an insurmountable balance on a credit card I'd forgotten we even have. So I'm going to be more involved in that stuff.

But I'm still responsible for maintaining the family calendar, and I try not to cringe at the utter predictability of it when he asks me, for the 3rd time, "Honey are we doing anything next weekend?"

Occasionally, Paul offers to take on the responsibility of making plans. And that has - at best - mixed results. He might buy tickets for a show months in advance, but not ask around for a sitter until 2 days before the curtain. He might cancel plans at the last minute and not realize that it really isn't considerate to the people who rearranged their schedule to watch Ellie.

And, as with tomorrow, he might start to set something up, then never follow through with the friends we wanted to have over for dinner and games. Alas, alack. Sometimes I still get frustrated. But today I'm all equanimity. Today I'm content with how bad I am at some things, and how it's only fair that Paul gets to be bad at some things too.

For the people we inconvenience, though, I am truly apologetic. If you are still free Saturday night, I am planning to make enchiladas and peanut butter and jelly cookies, all South Beach style, of course. Or, if you'd prefer, I'll have a large pot of chili going in preparation for my entry into a contest on Sunday and I'd be happy to try out my experimental recipe on you. I'm tentatively calling it CornFire, not for the timid. But I warn you that I'm still relatively new to cooking chili from scratch, without the cheater starter seasoning packet.

***

We still make sure that we take turns driving, though, so our kid(s) won't grow up thinking that daddy always drives when we're all in the car together. I've gotta draw the line somewhere.