Trophy husband

The recent government shutdown left me out of work on “furlough status” for two weeks. You can catch my rant about that here. The uncertainty associated with being locked out of work was unwelcome, but the unscheduled time off allowed me to experiment with a lifestyle I have been considering for some time: trophy husband.

The results were mixed.

A little background. From time to time, my wife Carissa has floated the prospect of her taking a too-good-to-refuse job in some city that would require me to leave my job. My stock answer has always been absolutely hell yes, but with conditions. Any move must (1) put us in the same or better financial position independent of my paycheck, (2) provide sufficient extra income to allow me to fly to the Rockies at least four times a year to fish/backpack/ski with my friends, and (3) include hiring somebody to clean the new house. (Some of you may be thinking, wait – didn’t you just move from Boise to Washington, D.C., so Carissa could pursue a dream job? And aren’t you still working? Here’s the thing about . . . hey look over there! Wolf carrying a baby!) 

Anyway, I enjoy my job but I’ve always believed that I would be just fine without one. When I hear a person claim they would continue working even if they scored a big time lottery win, I automatically know that person is a weirdo. Who wouldn’t like the idea of having a day with nothing to do? The freedom to create your own schedule or pursue whatever interests you at the moment? Maybe I would volunteer at a legal aid clinic, learn Spanish, write a book, train for a sub-three-hour marathon, distill artisanal moonshine in the shed out back. Maybe I would spend the day in my underwear watching footage from the baby panda-cam streaming live on the internet. Or maybe who knows what I'd do? But that’s the point! No more daily grind. Give me a hundred million dollar lottery prize and here is the only question about my job that will arise: Do I bother calling in to say I won’t be at work the next day or ever, or do I just not show up? (For the record, I would call or at minimum instruct my new personal assistant to call for me. I’m thoughtful that way).  

But back to the “trophy husband” business.  And I mean trophy husband and not stay-at-home dad (or “social media consultant” as some stay-at-home dads call themselves). When I imagine my life as a member of the family unencumbered by a nine-to-five job or compulsory education, I don’t imagine spending it exclusively tending to the house or serving as my kids’ chauffeur. Rather, I imagine my role is to accompany my executive wife to important functions with open bars while I display tasteful amounts of cleavage. Or to be the cool dad letting his kids watch age-inappropriate movies and wear flannel pajamas pants and slippers to the mall.

Yes, I’m aware there are those who doubt my suitability as a trophy husband (unless, as one friend put it when I floated this idea a while back, I intended to be a participation trophy). Whatever, haters. While I may not be “attractive” or “sophisticated” or “stylish” as those terms are commonly understood, at least in my imagination I can definitely rock a pair of black yoga pants while dropping kids off at school in my mid-sized SUV of European origin (probably a Land Rover but maybe an Audi). And then it’s off to the gym for hot yoga on Monday-Wednesday-Fridays and Pilates on Tuesday-Thursdays. After the gym, I meet up for skim milk lattes or espresso shots with other trophy spouses from the neighborhood to gossip about trophy spouses who aren’t there and humblebrag about our executive spouses (I would refer to Carissa as Sugar Momma). Then I would go home and spend afternoons drinking wine and posting shit on Pintrest and Facebook.

That’s not how it played out. What I discovered during the two-week government-shutdown is that trophy husbanding is not all cocktail parties and wearing Uggs with black tights to Trader Joe's. The first day I spent hanging out at home while a crew installed nineteen new windows in our house. Another day I watched a guy install our new blinds. Yet another day I watched a guy fix our dishwasher. I took kids to dentist appointments a few times. One day I taught the kindergartener to tie her shoes and worked more on riding her bike without the training wheels. We live in the middle of a damn deciduous forest so I spent a couple of days raking up damn leaves. Cleaned the gutters once. Ultimately I determined that the lifestyle is perhaps less glamorous than I first imagined. Certainly nothing worth getting a tummy tuck over.

For now I am keeping my day job. But if Sugar Momma comes through, the yoga pants are coming out.