The satisfaction of putting the wash out

4^th August, 2010

I’m not a traditional kind of girl where I believe women should cook, clean and look after the kids…far from it! Don’t get me wrong, I am not a feminist either. I suppose growing up with two brothers, I became a bit of a tom boy when I was a kid and although I loved baking cakes with my Mum, I also loved building things (even though I was never very good at it). I was a far cry from a girly girl who loved everything pink and wore pretty dresses.

It does bug me enormously when men try and be the alpha male, and carry things which they believe are ‘too heavy’ for me to carry. I do love a gentleman, but believe you me I carried my own suitcase when travelling to India….I don’t need help carrying a half empty bag!

After living with my partner and now husband for 4 years, it has suddenly dawned on me that I love playing the role of a housewife. I love planning, preparing and cooking dinners each night, I get a real satisfaction after cleaning the house, and one thing I do enjoy doing is hanging out the washing on the line. Ok….maybe I am sad and need to get out more, but the smell of fresh dry clothes come in from outside is just lovely!

I guess I love playing the role of a housewife because I also know that my husband’s house work is less gratifying. Could the fact that he once put my very expensive white knickers in the dark wash and came out grey, and the fact that he didn’t hover the house for 3 weeks when I was away, all be a ploy to get out of house chores? Even if they were, I still love him for it. One of the best things is when I cook for him each night and he eats his dinner and says ‘Wow that was the best Lasagne yet’. I even love him when he lies about how good my experimental dinner was when it was a failure.

Even though I will always be a tom boy at heart, and I will always roll my eyes when a man offers to carry my very light bag…..I love being a housewife and I especially adore my little pink laptop and pretty dresses!

Rosanna Ward