Playing House

Mollie writes:

I  love blogging with Millie.  We see the world in the same way.  I was just going to write a small comment about homemaking and how women see it differently than men (not in all cases, of course, but in most) when, in my usual verbose way, it turned into a blog entry.  So here's my spin on why things are the way they are.

I played house when I was a little girl.  I'd go into the garage, and then I'd redecorate.  I'd fashion beds out of planks, make them up with old quilt. and use card tables for dining room tables, covering them with old sheets.  On any one particularly rainy day, I could change a mud puddle into a vat of hot chocolate and ladle cups of cocoa for my dollies.  Nobody had to explain it to me, it was innate.

I had baby dolls, stuffed animals, real animals and brothers and sisters I'd rope into it.  They would be my babies, pets and friends.  So it was a no brainer when I decided that being a house wife was good enough for me.  I just loved playing house!

My husband was another person altogether.  He'd build forts, play soldier, ride his bike and, on one occasion, scrape all the gunpowder from a roll of caps to make a bomb (it didn't work)!  He and his best friend would go camping, alone, in the Mt. Hood National Forest.  John's dad would drop them off one morning  and pick them up the next day.  They were young teens, and these days, we'd run that parent into parenting classes, but in those days, a little adventure was the  norm.

John and I often wonder if we would have ever matched up with an on-line dating service if there were those in the seventies.  We had absolutely no shared interests - I liked movies, art museums and live theater.  John flew airplanes, scuba dived, sailed and rode dirt bikes.  We were polar opposites.

But 33 years together have blended us.  John now gardens with a passion and cooks quite well.  I now sail (ok, John sails but I love being there with him), travel, and, wonder of wonders, camp.  Who'd a thunk it?!

What hasn't changed is that I still love play house and John still wonders "what if?"  It's a natural that I fuss over clean kitchens and sparkly toilets.  And if John hadn't spent 33 years wondering "what if" our lives would be chaotic at best.

Sometimes polar opposites compliment each other.  We all know that if I didn't harp over tidiness, we'd be the next installment on "Hoarders" since John tends to save little bits of stuff for future projects.  And if John couldn't imagine a better way of doing things, we'd still be watching our old TV sets and Netflix wouldn't be an evening amusement at our place.

We were interesting parents as well.  I was stricter, believe it or not, and John was more relaxed.  I worried over every little thing and John figured what the kids didn't outgrow wouldn't kill them (probably).  In the end, it all worked out.

So here's to the difference between us!  Uber feminine girly meets hairy he-man.  They marry and live happily ever after (if you forget 1985).  She nags him over his underwear on the bathroom floor and he tells her to exercise more.  What could be sweeter?