The New Trend: Man as Trailing Spouse - Part 3

I can’t speak for all stay at home spouses, but it wasn’t a matter of not wanting to work; it kind of just turned out that way.  Four months after moving to Suzhou, I applied for a job teaching hotel employees business English.  It seemed like a great opportunity for both sides:  They wanted someone with a business degree, and my schedule was wide open. 

The hotel was still under construction when I arrived for the interview.  The staff was working in an underground bunker until the 700-room mega hotel was complete.  A girl named Nina, a Suzhou native, lead the interview.  She was professional, but hip, dropping some slang on me as I followed her down the hallway.  “So, you enjoy golf, huh?  That’s cool.” 

We came to a steel door.  When she opened it, there were twenty future housekeepers sitting quietly, all of them donning identical mint jumpsuits.  “You have twenty minutes to teach the class,” Nina said, and took a seat at the back of the class. 

“Nee how,” I said.  This was answered with blank stares.  “Can anyone say ‘hello?’”  Nothing.  Their shyness was astounding.  When a young man coughed, I turned to him abruptly.  “Can you count to three in English?”  That wild look in his eye said it all:  Had there been a window in the room, I’m sure he would have dove through it to escape.  His classmates stared at the floor.  It went on like this until I counted in Mandarin. 

“Yi, er, san.  One, two, three.” 

Slowly, they started to answer when I called on them. 

As it turned out, they could count to infinity in English.  “And what is this,” I asked, pointing to yet another number on the whiteboard. 

     “Five hundred eighty-seven thousand, six hundred twenty-nine,” they mumbled in unison. 

Convinced that they knew more than they were leading on, I spent the remainder of class preaching to them like an alien, divulging secrets of the future. 

     “When the people call, they will demand extra towels.” 

Nina called me the next day.  She fed me a line that I’d heard from disgruntled girlfriends, but not interviewers.  “Can we still be friends?”  Of course, this soft rejection was her way of ‘saving face.’  They say the Chinese strive for harmony similar to the way Americans idealize freedom.  It didn’t seem like a win-win situation at the time, but then again, it never does when you’re the one being dumped. 

Poker Night

The expat circle in Suzhou was tight.  Although many of my wife’s coworkers had my email address, they insisted on relaying messages through her. 

“Travis walked past my classroom today,” she’d say. 
“What did he have to say,” I’d ask. 

She’d throw back her shoulders and mimic their husky instructions.  “‘Tell your husband:  Poker, Thursday night.  Peace out.’”  After a long day alone, it was strangely refreshing to see a small Asian girl imitating a 200 pound rugby coach. 

Guys Night took place in the dining room of a pizzeria on Shin Do Street, a popular foreigner district.  The owners didn’t mind us gambling, so long as we kept buying half-liter bottles of Tiger beer.  The majority of us were from the US, with the others hailing from Canada, England, New Zealand, and Australia.  Conversations were centered on disputes in game rules, work complaints, and drunken hedonism. 

One guy, lets call him Richard, used to embark on epic, one-man benders, disappearing for days at a time.  He would invite us to join him, but we weren’t that stupid.  No one could keep up with him.  The police once found him passing out somewhere – a park, perhaps.  Not even Richard knew.  Apparently they searched his pockets and found only a business card.  When he finally came to, Richard was in the middle of the school courtyard, wondering, most likely, if he had a class to teach.  Of course, it was Sunday, so he probably just stumbled into the nearest bar.  

It was the juxtaposition that intrigued me.  Outside of work, their lifestyle wasn’t much different than, say, your average touring funk band.  Someone was always on the verge of a divorce, recovering from a motorcycle crash, or coaxing some fatally attracted ex off their balcony.  I knew the characters, followed their stories, and rooted for them when they were down.  Their stories never ceased to amaze me, but I couldn’t help but wonder if their lives were this hectic back home.

Travelers tend to be open minded when it comes to natives, but when we see “our kind” maneuvering outside the norm, lets face it – house rules are in effect.  I’m not saying that everyone was a train wreck.  Those just happened to be the stories I remember best.  Most of the people I met were decent and hard-working; but drama observers, nevertheless.  

My wife’s coworkers eventually started emailing me about Guys Night.  We became friends, and I enjoyed their company.  When it was time to cash in my chips, however, that unspoken fact still remained.  I wasn’t one of them. 

When I held up the mirror, that reflection – that reversal – was my everyday situation.  White people were the minority.  A woman worked while the man stayed at home cooking and cleaning.  It was Bizzaro World with chopsticks - and I liked it.  So what if somebody thought of me as a trailing spouse. 

     So, there’s that word again.  Trailing.  But I've decided not to attach feelings of resentment or inadequacy to it.  I don’t focus on the adjective.  I’m busy living the verb. 

The sunny side of trailing my wife is the memories we make together all over the world.  It means tropical breezes in Bali, sweating over a bowl of Tom Yum in Thailand, getting lost in the hutongs of Beijing, and having someone to confide in when no one answers the phone back home.  The roles are many, and I couldn’t be happier with what I do.  It takes courage to follow your compass, especially when it’s pointing in an ambiguous direction. 

Society accepts the stay at home wife/mother as an institution, but man as “housewife” seems to be a burden that many women aren’t ready to take on.  Male pride perpetuates, and often achieves, this illusion of “man as provider.”  Women deserve equality, but once they have it, where does it end? 

In their great, determined push toward equality, suppose the scale tips too far to the other side, beyond equality.  A society run completely by women would be a very different place.  Government would change.  They have that supporting, nurturing sense of control people always seek when they screw up.  Even war might become a thing of the past. 

I’m not saying that everything would be perfect.  Finding a decent plumber would be a nightmare.  But what the hell?  You can’t win them all. 

So, perhaps it’s time to slide over and let someone else take the wheel.  We’ve had a decent run, guys, and there’s nothing wrong with being domestic.  Just think of it as being a kid again.  As long as you finish your chores, you can go bowling, play golf, or start that novel you’ve been meaning to get around to. 

In fact, that’s what I’m going to do now…right after I clean the bathroom.

The New Trend: Man as Trailing Spouse - Part 1

“So, what do you do?”   

When asked this, most people talk about their job – how they spend their waking hours.   It’s a straightforward question, unless you delve to deep.  What does anyone really do?  Often it’s just small talk, but no one wants to get into a metaphysical probe at a clambake.  So I play along. 

“I am a trailing spouse.”

It’s something you don’t often hear a man say, but it’s catching on.  So what is a trailing spouse?  Basically, my wife took a job and I followed her.  She’s the bread winner, and I’m all right with that.  It’s the title that’s never agreed with me.  Trailing.   The adjective makes me think of a short-legged dog, struggling to keep up with its master.  It's the same mental image. And this invariably spawns the next question. 

“So what do you do?” 

Our situation is like a NASCAR team.  While my wife’s out there burning up the tracks, I' behind the scenes, keeping parts stocked and the engine running.  And like a pit crew, the roles are countless:  Husband, chef, maid, butler, travel companion, bug squasher, barista, grocery runner, repair man, listener of grievances…just to name a few.  

Of course, I don’t go through the entire list.  I’m usually interrupted by a sigh, or, if the listener has a decent poker face, a tight-lipped nod.  Man should work; man earns money, I hear telepathically.  But I reject that, at least for right now. 

  

"This opportunity is too good to pass up.  I’ll quit my job and follow you."

That’s how it began.  The words came easy at the time, as if I were merely stepping out to the corner market.  I’ll pick up a carton of milk…and while I’m at it, I’ll quit my job and move to China with you.  And then reality sunk in.  The decision would rake up every illusion of manliness I had.  Take a look around:  This wasn't in harmony with the concept of “Man as Provider.”  Thinking about it made my stomach knot, but it was exciting.  I wasn't just giving up a job; I was diving into the shallow end of a new life. 

Of course, my wife never asked me to do this, nor did she expect me to.  It’s just one of those things: you fall in love with a person, and the next thing you know, you’re having a Vegas wedding and moving half-way around the world to a communist country.  

There’s no question that I love my wife, but there were other factors at play.  I enjoyed my job as a medical claims adjuster, for instance, and it’s not a bad way to earn a living, but spending nine hours a day in a cubicle just wasn’t my passion.  Oddly enough, I believed in what my wife was doing more.  As a special needs teacher, she seemed to exude purpose, and there is a certain allure to being around someone that knows what they want out of life.  

I’ve didn’t have a clear vision concerning my career, and maybe that’s why I was so willing to abandon ship.  I used to get this restless feeling at work.  “There’s got to be more than this,” I used to say, and when it became too much, I’d sink a bag of weed to the bottom of a shampoo bottle and fly out to Utah, say, and to spend a week wandering the desert alone.  Back then I called it a "Vision Quest," but a more accurate description might be "intellectual restlessness."

In those profound moments under the sun, I saw clearly.  What felt like a hectic work schedule was merely dazzling my brain – like junk food – providing it with no lasting nourishment.  My brain was hungry.  I was grateful for the money, but that underlying sense of tension, like a steadily rising hunger, did not mesh with the nine-to-five frame of mind.  I wanted to – no, I needed to – get away from Big Brother (as my manager called it) if I was going learn more about myself.  

 I’m not saying that the lone desert approach was particularly intelligent, or even original, but experimenting with my surroundings just happened to be my style of approach. I just listened for the call, and when it came, I went to where it needed me to go.