Hungry? Don't look at me!
By Maria Pascucci
(Originally published in The Buffalo News)
Picture one young wife bent over a stove, happily preparing
meatloaf while her husband watches the evening news.
Well, that's not me.
I hate to cook. My mom realized early that her only daughter was
not going to stay up into the wee hours of the night with her
baking apple, cherry and lemon meringue pies on the eve of Thanksgiving.
My husband loves to cook -- and he's good at it. So I figure,
who am I to deprive him of what he loves?
We sealed our agreement with a hug and a kiss before we married
almost two years ago: He would cook, and I would clean. Naturally,
our family and friends can't pass up the chance to comment.
Never will they say, "Shaun, you're so lucky that your wife
scrubs your sinks. She mops your floors, too? She keeps such a
nice home. Wherever did you find her?"
Nope. Instead, they say, "Maria, I can't believe you don't
cook. You're so lucky that Shaun does it for you. You mean he
comes home from working all day and has to cook? Wherever did
you find him?"
Sometimes the women's voices drip with envy, and sometimes their
tone is of sheer disdain -- as in, "Why aren't you performing
your wifely duties?" Would it be rude of me to bring up the
fact that if my dear hubby didn't know how to boil an egg but
I loved to cook, people wouldn't find anything worth mentioning?
Well, as soon as the honeymoon ended (which was about five seconds
after we moved in together), we knew our arrangement wasn't going
to work without a little blending of roles. One Saturday morning,
Shaun took me by the hand and said, "Look honey, I made the
bed." His face beamed with the pride of a second-grader who
flashes his latest spelling test with a shiny red star in his
mother's face.
My first thought as I looked at our bed with the rumpled sheets,
misaligned pillows, and comforter hanging too far over the bed
skirt was, "It's not quite how I make it." But I replied,
"Thanks honey, it looks great!"
Then there was the first time I surprised my husband by cooking
dinner. In 1940, writer Grace L. Pennock said, "Add to one
small furnished apartment a bride with no experience in cooking
and housekeeping, and you get either a great adventure or a very
bad situation." I got both.
Frozen ravioli with my favorite Classico sauce straight from the
can seemed like a reasonable choice. Five minutes before Shaun
was due to arrive home, I set the table, lit the candles, and
surveyed the kitchen. I bubbled with pride. I heard the key turn,
the door open, and in walked my shocked husband who received the
impromptu greeting from his loving wife, "Don't get used
to this!"
I showed off the ravioli I had slaved over for 25 minutes, but
all he could do was stare at the pot on the stove. "You used
this on the stove?" he asked, picking up the pot and inspecting
it suspiciously like a mom who holds up her favorite Christmas
candleholder and notices the tiny cracks that appear to be held
together with Super Glue.
"Yeah, it looks like the ravioli pot my mom uses, except
this one is smaller."
All he could do was burst out laughing before informing me, "Maria,
that's a mixing bowl -- you cooked on our stove with a metal mixing
bowl!"
"Well, at least I cooked. Do you want the cheese ravioli
or the meat?"
So I ask you: Who cares if I don't know the difference between
a pot and a mixing bowl or that my husband's idea of making the
bed involves tossing the comforter in the air and holding his
breath to see where it lands? Marriage can't be reduced to a scorecard
tallying household chores.
And our loved ones? Well, at the next family get-together, when
I taste one of their latest double fudge brownie concoctions with
caramel swirls, they'll forever roll their eyes -- some with amusement
and some with disgust -- when I say: "Wow, this is delicious!
Can you give Shaun the recipe?"
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