Ten Years

Chris and I recently celebrated our ten year anniversary. (And by celebrated I mean we fed the missionaries dinner and took all three kids with us to U-Swirl for ice cream.) I have been thinking about what has made our marriage a success these past ten years, and it all comes down to one thing--division of labor.

In our marriage, we each have our own jobs to do. For instance, I give birth to our children, and Chris turns off the lights and locks the doors each night. This works well, as long as we remember DO NOT DO THE OTHER PERSON'S JOB!

I discovered this when I allowed Chris to accompany me to the birth of our first child. It was my job to push this child out, and having him sit around watching Japanese animation was not helping. Neither was his decision to go into insulin shock. I mean, really, I'm kind of trying to push a baby with a 95th percentile head out, and I don't need all the medical attention going to my husband.

By the birth of my second child, I realized it was time to pull the division of labor card.

"Where's your husband?" the nurse asked, when she came in to check on me.

"Oh, I sent him away. He was driving me crazy. I'll call him when it gets close."

By the third baby I drove myself to the hospital.

"Bye, honey," I said, grabbing my keys, "I'll call you when I get to a ten."

"I'm here to be induced. Is this where I check in?" I asked, when I arrived at the hospital.

"Are you alone?" the nurse exclaimed, like no woman has ever driven herself to the hospital to have a baby.

"Yep."

That was the best birthing experience of the trio. I had a job to do, and I just focused on getting that kid out without interruptions. Division of labor. Literally.

Now Chris has the job of turning off the lights and locking up each night. Sometimes when he is out of town for the night, I actually never turn off the lights. I'll be upstairs in bed reading, when I decide it's time to turn off my light and go to sleep. Then I remember I never turned off the downstairs' lights.

Curses, I'll think, Those lights are going to have to stay on all night. It's not my job to turn them off.

One night Chris was really sick and lying in bed. I decided to be nice and lock the doors and turn out the lights for him. I came upstairs to tell him of my good deed.

"But that's my job," he said, slightly hurt.

It's not just chores we divide up. It's our brains. I have always been a math idiot. Chris is a math genius. So when I married him, I decided to allow all parts of my brain that were being poorly used to store math facts to be re-purposed into storing other important information like how long it's been since Deacon last pooped. Chris's brain could store all the math knowledge for the both of us, and mine would store all the knowledge of our family's toileting habits.

Last Sunday during my Gospel Doctrine lesson, I am teaching the parable of the unmerciful servant.

"Does anybody know how many dollars 10,000 talents equals?" I ask.

Someone raises his hand, "I've got written in my scriptures 1 talent=$325."

I'm standing in front of the class, and I am trying desperately to figure out how much 325 times 10,000 equals, and for the love of Pete, I cannot do it. All I know is that there are three rolls of toilet paper under the kids' bathroom sink, eight in the downstairs, twenty-four in mine, and Deacon last pooped the night before at seven o'clock.

"Hmmm," I say, "I'm kind of a math idiot, so I can't figure out how much that equals, but I'll tell you what James E. Talmage said in Jesus the Christ."

I may not be good at math, but I've figured this out. Division is only one factor in a happy marriage. The other important factor is mint brownies. If you go to a ward party, and your husband notices someone brought mint brownies, and then he notices his wife is still struggling at the back of the line to carry Deacon's plate and her own plate, and he grabs a mint brownie for her because he's afraid there might not be any left when she gets to the end of the line, then my friend, you have found something special. I love those things. Mint brownies and my hubby.