This morning I got up and started scrubbing down the kitchen. It's gotten rather snoggy after weeks of neglect. But there I was sweating and groaning like a Marine on an obstacle course, wiping down the cupboard doors, and my husband walks through and says, "You missed a spot." I slapped the rag down, got up off my knees, and said, "Why is it that on your day off, you actually have a day off and when it's my day off, I clean house?" He shrugged. I threw the rag at him. He finished swabbing down the cupboard doors, after which I introduced him to the dustmop and the wetmop while I started preparing a pot of hammocks and beans (his favorite). When he finished the floors I led him outside where the trees are full of grapefruits, oranges, and lemons that need picking and boxing up for friends and family as we can't possibly use them all, and he's now in the kitchen juicing lemons. These things he is doing without complaint, and is even whistling while he works like one of the Seven Dwarves, and so I've concluded that his lack of participation in the finer things of life such as dusting, mopping, scrubbing, and organizing, isn't due to disinterest or even laziness. It's because I never asked. Just like Mom. We kids always helped with housework, but my dad didn't do a thing in the house. His domain was the yards and the garage. My mother, though she didn't work outside the house, would clean until her fingertips bled. I'm just not willing to do that and I don't think I should have to spend my days off cleaning and running errands and doing laundry and grocery shopping, dog walking, bill paying, and whatever else is left to do if I'm still breathing.

Now he's just come in and offered to get us a hotel room in April up north so we can go up and ride the train through the canyon with my cousins who are coming on vacation that week. Maybe his day of chores has enlightened him regarding how much work I do beyond the eight hours that brings a paycheck. I'm practical enough to know that things will never be equal when it comes to housework, but he can at least have a share in the work.

Now I've got to go take a shower and get myself cleaned up. Wonder if he'll share in that too.