Packing Your Husband's Suitcase

The nitty gritty details of people's lives fascinate me.

Like this one: I had coffee last week with a friend who has one daughter. For the first four years of her daughter's life, her husband was a stay-at-home dad. My friend, a smart, feisty design and manufacturing entrepreneur, worked 14 hour days and traveled for two weeks at a time to Asia to visit her clients and manufacturing plants. I say all this just to establish that my friend is not a traditional stay-at-home mom (whatever that is), although now her husband works and she stays home.

Over coffee, she casually mentioned that she had to pack her husband's suitcase that night because he was going on a four-day trip. She said it as if all good wives pack their husbands' suitcases. I experienced that horrible sinking feeling of: Here's another reason I am and will forever be a lousy spouse. Because it has never occurred to me to pack my darling husband's suitcase.

I can't stop thinking about this factoid of her life. The question that haunts me is why she packs his suitcase. Does she understand the wifely arts better than I? Did they agree, in a division of labor scheme, that the stay-at-home spouse gets packing detail? (Maybe this tradition started when she worked and he stayed home.) Or perhaps she's just nice?

So the topic today is: Do you pack your husband's suitcase when he goes on trips? Does he pack yours? Is this good or bad? Do you feel guilty or resentful about chores you do or don't perform? What are the odd little favors you do for each other to help balance your collective work and family lives?

By Leslie Morgan Steiner |  January 24, 2007; 7:00 AM ET  | Category:  Division of Labor
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