A balabusta – a homemaker - I am not. I like to pretend a few times a year by making a brisket or perhaps a challah, but my influence over the domestic is superficial at best.
And so, in the 15 years since we met, my husband and I have found the roles that suit us best and provide balance to our home. McKay is our COO, and I am our CFO.
The COO, or chief operating officer, handles paperwork, schedules, bill-paying, timeliness, cleanliness and rectitude. The CFO is the chief fun officer. That’s me. I arrange playdates, serve popcorn for dinner and hang twinkly lights from plants. Wearing an apron is the extent of my balabusta behavior.
I’m afraid this is something our children have internalized (the tween, at least; I’m hopeful the toddler doesn’t care yet). Questions about upcoming meals, missing sweatshirts and permission forms are rightfully directed to my husband. And so when McKay Stangler, Ph.D., lover of laundry, household chef and key breadwinner began traveling for work, I knew there would be a learning curve. I prepared for this change with an excess of false bravado: Of course I know how to cook, and certainly I remember how to use the washing machine, and naturally I know that dogs eat twice a day and children eat three times a day — and not always in that order! McKay would return home to clean children, and a freshly cooked meal and a ready-made cocktail.
But then he left. In only a few days, I learned a lot about myself: I consider bedtimes and school drop-off times to be suggestions. I leave cabinet doors open — all of them, all the time. I prefer to build towers of wet dishes atop dry ones instead of putting the dry ones away first. I dig through piles of laundry for a full day (maybe two) before I think to fold it. These small and infrequent stints of solo parenting leave me feeling humbled and awed by those who parent alone all the time.
At first, I was downright ashamed. What exactly did our children see when their father left town? A barely functional adult who woke the kids up too late and forgot to send the water bottle and just served doctored up, dorm-style ramen noodles for dinner. Also, is her shirt on backwards?
A few months ago, though, as I was bracing myself for McKay’s absence by creating obsessive checklists (“lock the door, turn off back lights, shower”), our 10-year-old Darby said to me, “Remember when Dad was out of town and we had a movie picnic and watched ‘Willow?’ That was the best. Can we have ramen again?” That’s when it clicked.
In the famous tale, Rabbi Zusya of Hannipol lay on his deathbed in tears. “You have nothing to fear from death, Rabbi!” said his students. “You have lived a life with the wisdom of Moses and of kindness of Abraham!”
The good rabbi groaned in turmoil, “When I am judged on my life, no one will ask why I did not act more like Moses and Abraham. Rather, they will ask me, ‘Zusya, why were you not more like Zusya?’”
I have grown a bit in recent months. Bedtime is still more of a 45-minute window and popcorn is still absolutely an acceptable dinner as long as there are carrot sticks on the side. But I also check in on the laundry situation every day that McKay travels, and Darby has taken on the role of feeding the dogs (I still feed the children with some regularity). I certainly feel more on top of everything if I’m wearing an apron.
Years from now, I pray that our older son will not say, “I wish my mom had been more of a balabusta.” Instead, he’ll pull up his AI glasses and project a hologram of one of our best afternoons: popsicles melting on the countertop and Velvet Underground in the background as Darby skateboards, ever so carefully, inside the house.
I’ll never be the COO. But I’m a pretty solid chief fun officer.